


Uncharted: Assassin's Heart

by Beklet



Category: Uncharted (Video Games)
Genre: Assassins & Hitmen, F/M, Occult, badass OC, spoilers for uncharted 4
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-07
Updated: 2019-07-25
Packaged: 2019-10-05 21:46:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 25
Words: 59,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17332928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beklet/pseuds/Beklet
Summary: It had been three years since Caeli had taken a job with Nathan Drake, when she was suddenly called by him, asking for help to sneak into a black market auction she luckily had an invitation to. Reluctantly, she agrees, even with the second person's identity kept secret due to Nate thinking she wouldn't believe him if he told her who it was. He was right on that front. At the auction, she finds out the second person is Samuel Drake, Nate's brother who was long believed to be dead, and with whom Caeli had spent many years being more than just friends with.In a bid to save his life they need to find Avery's treasure, for the millions it is worth is the only thing of enough fortune to buy Sam's life back. However, danger has forever been a part of each of their lives, and this time is no different. As they come across puzzles and tests which bring them steps closer to the treasure they are racing against a mercenary army owned by an old partner and run by a military mastermind.This job seems to bring the three into more danger than they had ever faced before and with a lack of trust between Caeli and Sam, this may be the last job they ever take.





	1. Reunion

For the better part of a year Caeli had been searching for Katherine Marlowe, for any sign of the occult organisation she ran… and now as she stood outside of the French chateau she knew exactly why Marlowe had surfaced only now.

For who stood a mere few meters from her was none other than Nathan Drake.

“Drake’s ring…” Caeli whispered to herself, seeing the silver piece of jewellery hanging from a string of leather around his neck. “The decryption device.” She added, seeing a piece of the gold trinket sticking out of one of Drake’s pockets. She hid in the shadows, a talent of hers, as Drake followed the correct path along some stone tiles to open the next door.

He had already taken out a multitude of Marlowe’s henchmen to get to this point, a fairly impressive feat with how well Marlowe’s men were trained. Caeli continued following Drake and Victor Sullivan until they all reached the next puzzle, she could only smirk as he struggled to figure out what had to be done.

“Have you bothered looking at the floor?” Caeli asked, leaning against one of the walls, her foot propping her leg up underneath her.

“Who the hell?” Sullivan asked, the both of them turning to face her, Drake’s eyes widened as he realised who she was.

“Holy shit…” Nathan trailed off as she pushed off of the wall and walked towards them.

“It’s been a few years, I see you’re still up to your usual antics. Getting hunted by bad people while searching for treasure, risking your life for barely any reward.” Caeli stated.

“Caeli Porter?” Nathan asked as if double checking.

“Um, the one and the only,” Caeli replied, her hands out by her sides.

“You look  a little different…” Nate trailed off, pointing to his hair as she touched her own. The last time they had seen each other her hair had gone down to her waist, now it was cropped short on the sides, a little lengthier on the top. It was still strange for there to be any at all after eleven years of having it shaved off.

“Yeah, that’s a short chapter in a long story. One that involves Talbot and Marlowe.” Caeli stated as she moved around to each stone carving on the wall and memorised the tile markings that would help unlock the next doorway.

“We have time,” Sully stated, which made Caeli laugh as she walked to the contraption that would move tiles around to the correct places.

“I’m fairly sure time is the one thing you _don’t_ have right now,” Caeli stated as each tile moved into place and the small opening shuddered underneath the tile puzzle. “Besides, next room is open.” She shrugged her shoulders, running towards the small opening and sliding into it. “Which dead body are you looking for exactly?” She asked next as Nathan and Sully came through, Nathan pointed to the fanciest looking coffin in the room.

“That one,” Caeli smirked, pushing open the top of it and looking inside. Next to the skeleton seemed to be what was a piece of an amulet, she picked it up, turning it over gingerly in her hands before throwing it to Nathan.

“Looking for that?” Nathan caught it, looking at both sides carefully.

“The other half must be in Syria…” Nathan stated, “We have to get to Chloe and Cutter before Marlowe does.” He added.

“Look, we do have to get to them fast kid but we have to get out of here first.” Sully stated, then looking Caeli over, “and from what I can see she doesn’t even have a gun.”

“Did I ever need one? Honestly?” Caeli asked.

“We’re dealing with an army here, you realise that right?” Sully asked next.

“Okay, first of all, it’s not an army, it’s an agency, second of all, I was raised as an assassin within this Order. I know how they work.” Caeli added.

“These people are the ones who raised you as an assassin?” Nathan asked.

“Yes, they’re the ones my family ran to America to get away from,” Caeli answered, her eyebrows furrowing. “They’re also the ones that took me back to England, the ones that kidnapped me.”

“That’s why you disappeared…” Nathan trailed off, Caeli nodded.

“I’ll explain on the way to Syria, but we need to get out of here first,” Caeli added, running back to the small exit, pausing as soon as she made her way to the other side. “Shit.” She whispered, looking Talbot in the eyes.

“Nice to see you again, Caeli.” He stated with his all too silvery voice.

“Wish I could say the same about you.” She replied, not even taking a step as Sully and Nathan came out of the other room to see Talbot and his two henchmen at the exit. Sully immediately reached for the shotgun at his waist, but Caeli touched his arm. “Don’t…” She trailed off as the two henchmen pointed their guns towards them. “You can’t move that fast.” She added as Talbot pointed his own handgun towards the three.

“Harris, would you relieve Drake of the artefact,” Talbot instructed, and the man to his left began walking towards Nathan who put up a minor fight, only until he realised that Sully would be shot if he made another move. With the artefact now in Harris’ hands, the man began walking away and back to Talbot.

A hissing suddenly filled the room. Caeli looked to the ceiling, to the walls, the pillars, the floor, seeing hundreds, maybe thousands of spiders larger than her head swarming the room like a flood.

“What the hell?” Nathan whispered, but Caeli was focused on Harris as the spiders began crawling over his body, and he immediately fell to the ground. Dead. She stayed close to Sully, the spiders seeming to dislike the light from the fire torch that he was holding. She couldn’t hear as Talbot took the piece of the amulet from Harris, as she slipped into a familiar calm she knew only ended badly.

Immediately she began looking around the room for other potential exits, assuming Talbot wouldn’t let them leave through the front door. There was a potential exit, but they would have to wait until that other door was closed to find out for sure. She was snapped back to reality with one sentence.

“Your torch seems to be dying out. Good luck with that.”

Caeli turned towards Sully, seeing the flame slowly becoming weaker. They wouldn’t have much time.

“God, what a dick,” Sully stated.

“Doesn’t even sum up the half of it,” Caeli replied, watching as the door closed.

“We gotta find a way out of here fast,” Nathan added as if they didn’t already know.

“Stay close,” Sully stated as he began walking around the room, but Caeli immediately pointed where she had seen an exit.

“Over there, there’s a little bit of sunlight,” Caeli stated, so they immediately began running towards it, Sully was lifted into the hole first, Caeli next and Nathan jumped in last with help from Caeli to pull him in, the torch dropped on the floor in their wake as it finally blinked out. Running through the strange tunnel the spiders continued following them, flooding the walls, the floor and the ceiling.

“Jesus Christ, they’re coming from everywhere.”

Sully tripped over, but Nathan helped him back up as Caeli stayed behind them, the spiders doing their best to crawl onto her body but failing. Getting to the end of the tunnel, Caeli closed the door behind them, they thought it would keep the spiders out but then they began crawling out from the gaps in the ceiling.

“Oh god, they’re coming through the ceiling!” Sully exclaimed, Caeli just turned to look at him.

“Yeah, no shit Sherlock!” She shouted as her feet began to run faster than before, making sure she was still behind the other two.

“Come on – Run!” Nathan shouted.

“What else are we supposed to do?!” Caeli was beginning to remember why she felt that she had always been surrounded by idiots when working with these two previously. Finally, they broke through the tunnel and made it through to a spiralling staircase, which was quickly scaled before they jumped out of the turret. Caeli ignored as they carried on, getting the spiders off of their bodies now they were in sunlight, the few that were on Caeli ran off of their own accord, averted to the light itself much like she was.

Although she had to ignore that as they escaped the chateau, through fire, both of its elemental form and of a bullet rain, and had to push down the urge to go after Talbot without any kind of preparation. It wasn’t until they were in the safety of the forest surrounding the burning chateau behind them that they were able to greet each other properly.

“It’s been a while…” Nathan trailed off as he hugged her.

“Twelve years.” She stated, pulling away from him. “I’m sorry about what happened in Panama.” She added, looking to the ground before meeting his eyes again. Nathan didn’t reply to her. “I miss him too.” They all started walking through the forest, to the car that Sully and Nathan had come in and the motorbike she had brought.

Before the Order had taken her back, she had worked closely with the Drake brothers and Sullivan, she rarely left their sides since running into Sam during her own escapades. Eleven years… she had been by their side for eleven years before she had been ripped away from it all. Nathan was like a brother to her, Sam… that had been a different story entirely.

Once they made it back to the car, her motorbike lifted onto the back of it as she took the back seat Sully turned to look at her.

“You’re going to tell us what happened, right?”

Caeli smiled weakly before giving her story to them.


	2. Samuel Drake

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Caeli finds out that Samuel Drake is not as dead as she had thought...

**Three Years Later**

The melody of her phone’s ringtone echoed around the room, a sigh leaving her lips as she searched for it on top of the table covered in a varied amount of utensils. Caeli almost didn’t answer, a little too focused on what she was doing and not wanting to be disturbed. But, something told her this was important, so she answered.

“Nathan, I told you to only call me if there was an emergency so this better be good.” She stated, putting the phone onto speaker mode as she picked up a knife.

 _“Well, it’s not an emergency, but it has the same sense of urgency in needing to call you.”_ Nathan replied, there was a pause as she waited for the rest of the information. _“You aren’t in the middle of killing someone, are you?”_ Caeli studied her knife.

“No.” She answered, placing a potato on the chopping board and cutting into it.

_“Torturing?”_

“You know I don’t do that.”

_“Do you have someone tied up to a chair in order to get information from them?”_

Caeli’s eyes lifted from her kitchen bench to the dining room, where there was indeed a man tied to one of the chairs, a gag in his mouth to keep him from shouting while she cooked her tea.

“Maybe, maybe not.” She answered, giving the man a small smile before returning her focus to the potatoes.

_“Look, I’ll get to the point here, the black market auction in Italy-”_

“The one in three days that I have an invite to, what about it?” Caeli asked, hearing Nathan stutter for words on the other side of the phone. “What? You should know I’m loaded by now, I’m an assassin. Even better, an occult assassin.”

_“The fact that you already have an invite to the auction is actually…”_

“Exceptionally useful? You’ll be wanting me to get you in I guess. After all, there is another Saint Dismas cross for sale, which is intact, and I know Rafe is interested and will be there. I might be the only person able to outbid him on it.” Caeli stated. “Then again, you’re probably not planning on buying it, you’re planning on stealing it, aren’t you?”

_“Researched everything, have you?”_

“Only to do with the auction. As you would know, I don’t go anywhere or do anything without having a plan and knowing everything that I possibly can. On that note, how many people am I getting in?”

_“Two.”_

“You and Sully, I’m guessing…” She trailed off, she heard an awkward cough from the other side of the phone that didn’t belong to Nathan.

 _“Not exactly, Sully has a way of getting in, he knows the people running it after all.”_ That fact was also something she knew, but she hadn’t known for sure whether Sully would use that way in or not.

“Who’s the other person then?” She asked, there was silence for roughly ten seconds. “Nathan.”

_“That’s not important-”_

“No, that’s not how this works, Nathan. You tell me, or I’m not getting you in, I am not going to be having any liabilities in a place as dangerous as a black market auction filled with mercenaries, assassins and other criminals, who have a tonne of money to throw around and probably all have a small army of guards with them. Whoever you’re going to be coming with is going to have to be a lot stealthier than you are since you can never seem to get through a place quietly.” She could have sworn she then heard a laugh from the other side of the phone.

_“You’re not going to believe me if I tell you, okay? And over the phone you’re going to think it’s a prank. Just know it’s someone you can trust.”_

“Nathan, you are walking on thin fucking ice…” Caeli trailed off, wondering who the hell it was that he thought she wouldn’t believe was a part of this.

_“I generally am.”_

“You’re telling me.” She paused as she processed all of that information, turning it over in her head. If it was someone she was supposed to be able to trust… there were very few people she did, so it must be someone she already knew or else Nathan wouldn’t be withholding the name from her. She trusted Nathan with her life, and if Sully was already in on this then his trust had already been invested into it.

But then again, Sully would do anything for Nathan without question.

“Is it someone I at least know?” She asked, the answer to this question would determine whether she helped or not.

_“More like… knew.”_

That was the best answer she was going to get, but it was enough.

“Okay, I’ll let you in, I’ll meet up with Sullivan and make sure you get in and out safely. Whether it involves a gunfight or not is a different story, especially depending on who this other person is.” Once again she heard that same bout of laughter, she wasn’t on speaker phone, she knew that, but the volume must be maxed out on Nathan’s phone for the other person to be hearing it. “Wear something nice, I’ll meet you and your mystery person in Italy.”

***

Originally, when Caeli had decided she was going to go to this auction, she had planned on wearing a pair of clean skinny jeans and a nice shirt, maybe a silk button up…

She really hated that she had changed her mind on that front.

“Sully, if you look at my legs one more time one of my heels will be going through your eye.” Caeli stated as the older man tried his best to keep his eyes on hers.

“You have nice legs.” He responded with a shrug.

“I didn’t need confirmation from a man who is 22 years my senior.” She replied, a smirk on her face as they walked up the stairs to the room they would be letting Nathan and his mystery partner through. Caeli walked to the light, beginning to flash it in a familiar pattern which meant safe passage for the small band of criminals. “Let’s hope that was enough.”

“Do you know who Nate’s with?” Sully asked as he went to unlock the window and push it open enough to be gripped from the other side.

“No, he wouldn’t tell me.” Caeli answered as she sat on the fine leather couch as they waited for the two to arrive.

“Fair enough, you wouldn’t believe him if he did.” Sully replied, Caeli’s deadly eyes flicked to meet the older man’s.

“You know who it is, don’t you?” She asked, but she didn’t receive a completely verbal response. It was one of those mumbles that hide what the speaker was truly intending to say. “You’re not going to tell me either, are you?” She didn’t need a reply to know the answer to that question. “Nathan didn’t mention my name over the phone, whoever it is doesn’t know who I am, do they?”

“You’re right on that front.” Sully replied.

“Why? Why would Nathan keep our names secret from each other unless whoever he’s with wouldn’t believe who I was either? I don’t even know who that could be…” She trailed off, Sully just took a seat next to her in silence, lighting a cigar as they continued waiting.

“Alright… thanks.” Caeli sat up straight as she heard Nathan’s voice from outside, Sully didn’t seem to hear anything but that didn’t surprise her.

“Ah… Nathan?” She recognised that voice. A hand gripped the window and opened it slightly. “Nathan?” _No._

“What?” Assuming something was going on outside of the window, the next words came from Nathan’s mouth. “Oh, right.” There was a pause as they must have been taking off their jumpsuits, but in that time Caeli stood up from the couch, her eyes fixated on the window before looking to Sully with wide eyes. He gave her a small, soft smile, to comfort her, before her focus turned back to the window.

“Okay…” That voice. She had to be imagining that voice.

“You all right?” Nathan asked.

“Yeah. How do I look?” Caeli’s eyes began watering as she heard that voice again. A voice she would be able to recognise anywhere. The voice that haunted her every waking hour.

“Like four hundred million bucks. Let’s go.” Nathan stated before opening the window.

“All right, I’m right behind you.” With the windows now wide open she could see who the voice belonged to, completely ignoring Nathan as he climbed through the window. Her chest was tightened, she could barely breathe and she was beyond ready to punch Nathan in the nose for not telling her.

With the lights off she was able to do what she did best and hide in the shadows as Nate began talking to Sully, giving her time to compose herself before the light would turn on and her position would be given away. Sully then turned on the light next to the couch, Caeli walked slowly around to behind the two men who had climbed through the window. Sully was then reintroduced to the man who was supposed to be dead, before Nathan asked the question she had been dreading.

“Where’s Caeli?” Sully looked directly into her eyes, giving away her position. Although the two others hadn’t noticed that just yet.

“Caeli? I thought she was…”

“Samuel?” Caeli whispered, Samuel and Nathan both turning to look at her. She was shaking her head, almost in denial. “You’re dead.”

“I thought you were dead…” Samuel whispered back to her. “That’s why you didn’t tell me who you’d called.” Looking at Nathan.

“And why you didn’t tell me who else was coming.” Caeli added, her grey eyes locked onto Nathan’s for a second before looking back to Sam. Fifteen years… it had been fifteen years since she had last seen him. Fifteen. When the Order had told her that he had died she had been in denial but came to accept it… she never thought that he had maybe…

“Yeah, but we don’t have time for that now. We have to get to the storage room-”

“No, you don’t get to spring something like this on us and assume we don’t need at least a single minute to process it.” Caeli stated, barely able to breathe. “Sully, you explain everything to them, I’ll meet you downstairs.”

“Meet us downstairs? Are you kidding me?”

“Nate…” Sam warned his brother, seeing the anger boiling behind Caeli’s eyes, could sense that something was off.

“You’re lucky I’m not abandoning you entirely, Nathan.” She growled, her eyes turning dark. The shadows in the room seemed to become darker, stretching towards her.

“What the hell?” Sam whispered as he noticed that fact.

“Like I said before, I’ll meet you downstairs.” She stated simply, turning to walk from the room and closing the doors behind her. She took a deep breath, closing her eyes, compartmentalising all of those stupid emotions she had felt in that room and began the descent into the main room where the auction was being held.

A waiter offered her a glass of champagne, which she gladly took, taking two and saying she was waiting to meet up with someone when in reality she drank the first within a few seconds and the other within a few minutes.

“Sully…” She trailed off, hoping that the old man was wearing his earpiece that she had given him.

_“Yep.”_

“I know that you didn’t want to think that Rafe was here… but I have eyes on him.” She told him.

 _“Okay, the boys are just getting to the cellar now to turn off the electricity and for Sam to become more like a waiter. Sam is going to get the cross when the light’s are out.”_ Sully explained.

“I could have dealt with the lights without-”

 _“We don’t want to freak Sam out just yet.”_ Sully replied, Caeli sighed. _“They’re putting their earpieces in now.”_

“Okay.” Caeli responded. “I guess all three of you might want to know who else I have eyes on…”

 _“Who?”_ She heard Nathan ask, she picked up a third glass of champagne, leaving the two empty glasses on the tray in it’s place.

“Nadine Ross.” Caeli answered with a smile. “Watch out for Shoreline men, if she’s here then she’s on a job…” She trailed off, realising something. “Avery’s Cross, Shoreline… Both of them are Rafe’s doing, Rafe is going to do everything he can to get that cross, so be careful.” She added, putting two and two together.

 _“Will do.”_ Sam. Bloody Sam. Alive.

It took nearly five minutes, but she was soon able to see Sam in a waiter’s uniform, carrying some wine on a tray. She couldn’t focus on him right now, that would have dangerous, possibly deadly, results. With that thought in mind she kept her focus on Rafe, who was still keeping a good distance from everyone, and would probably keep that way until the bidding would start on Avery’s cross. Well, that’s what she had thought until he joined Sully and Nadine’s conversation.

“Sully, give me a signal when you want me over there.” Caeli whispered, and it wasn’t soon after that when Sully scratched the back of his head, she figured that was as good a signal as ever. She walked slowly, to get an idea of where the conversation was going. Currently, Rafe was beginning to lose the fun of the conversation and figure out why Sully was even there. She probably wouldn’t help anything, but she could ease the tension… or shift it back to Rafe.

“How’d you find out about it?” Rafe asked, holding Sully by the elbow, Caeli realised that was as good a time as ever to cut in.

“It?” Sully asked, trying to cover himself, but Rafe saw right through it, so Caeli jumped in.

“Oh, he found out about the auction through me. Just like how you have Nadine, I wanted some back up as well.” She stated, pulling her mid-height ponytail over her shoulder.

“Caeli Porter…” Rafe trailed off, looking her up and down. The black romper she was wearing was beginning to feel rather exposing under his eye, even with obligatory flesh-coloured tights underneath. Even with the sleeves that covered the entirety of her arms. It didn’t feel like enough. “Thought you were still with the Order?”

“That’s some outdated information, I’ve been free of them for four years now.” She replied, crossing an arm across her chest as she lifted the champagne flute to her lips for a sip. Rafe furrowed his eyebrows in confusion before accepting the information.

“You look good.” He added. “But you can’t tell me that two of Drake’s companions are here without him.”

“Drake’s retired, you would know that. You keep tabs on him, borderline stalking in my opinion-” She replied.

“Cut the bullshit, Caeli.” Rafe stated as he swiped the glass from her hand, everyone in the room stopping to look at them. “I don’t know how you scammed your way in here-”

“I was invited, asshole, but please continue.”

“If you think about bidding on Avery’s cross, I can tell you exactly how you’re going to be leaving. In a goddamn body bag-”

“Rafe!” Nadine warned the man.

“Well, you get the point.” Rafe finished, a lot calmer.

“That you think you could kill me? Like the Order didn’t try? You even make a wrong move around me and you’ll be dead before you even get to blink.” Caeli whispered, just loud enough for the four of them to hear, making sure that her eyes turned dark to prove her point.

“Well, it was lovely seeing you both.” Sully stated, touching Caeli’s shoulder and directing her away. He started trying to get Nate’s attention through the earpieces, but Caeli was more focused on her shaking hands. The audacity of that man…

“I should kill him, Sully. It would save us a lot of trouble.” She whispered, looking the man in the eyes as he shook his head.

“That’s not how we do things.” Sully responded.

“I know it’s not, but maybe this time we should make an exception.” She growled, looking over to Rafe.

“God, go get a drink.” Sully instructed, she rolled her eyes and did so, pulling out her earpiece to get some quiet. The bidding for the cross began, she only walked back to Sully once she had a vodka in hand. Rafe currently had the only bid on the artefact, that was clearly a problem once she reached Sully again and he was talking to Nate through the earpiece.

“Bid with what? I don’t have that kind of scratch…”

“Need to waste some time?” Caeli asked, Sully just nodded in reply. Caeli put the ear piece back in just in time to hear Sam speaking.

_“Guys, if we do not get this cross then I’m as good as dead.”_

Caeli grabbed the paddle from Sully’s hand and held it in the air. The auctioneer accepting her bid on the object. Rafe just looked at her, a warning look on her face which she completely ignored, he put in another bid as she took the earpiece out again.

“We have one-hundred and ten thousand.”

Caeli held the paddle up again.

“Make it one-fifty.” She stated loud enough for the auctioneer to hear.

“We now have one-hundred and fifty-thousand euros in the room.”

“Make it two-hundred.”

“Two-fifty.”

“Let’s speed this up, make it five-hundred.”

“If you think I’m going to go higher than five-hundred thousand for that old thing…” Caeli said with a smirk, having a mouthful of vodka whilst staring Rafe directly in the eyes. She held the glass up to him, winking as her eyes turned black, just before the lights went out.


	3. Shadow-Walking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Caeli, Sully and the Drake brothers escape from the Rossi mansion before Caeli and Sam face a confrontation of a different kind...

Sully and Caeli split up, Caeli went through the hallways she had memorised to get herself out, taking herself into a different room filled with glass cases and cabinets filled with different items. She could feel that someone was following her, so she calmed her walking, tightened her ponytail and turned a corner into a study.

Having a clear idea of who it was that was following her she took up a seat on the table, sitting one leg over the other, her hands resting either side of her. She waited for Rafe to enter the study after her, her eyes focused directly on his. It was clear that it unnerved him, her pale grey eyes had that effect on people.

“So you bet on it…” He stated, his face showing no amount of civility as he had done in the auction room. “But you didn’t intend to win it.”

“It’s a lot simpler to just steal it, less paperwork.” She replied, holding her hands in the air. “I don’t have it if that’s what you’re going to ask.” She added, placing her hands back on the table.

“Didn’t think you would,” Rafe replied, a venomous smile on his face.

“Good.”

“No, if you and Sullivan were here, that means the Drakes are too. One of them would have it. Sam was always the best pickpocket…” Rafe trailed off.

“So you know Sam’s alive then,” Caeli responded, a deadly look on her face. Rafe moved to run a finger along the spines of the books on the bookshelf,

“You remember how I said you’d be leaving?” He turned around with a handgun pointing directly at her head.

“In a body bag.” She replied, standing up from the table.

“Don’t move.” He told her, but she laughed instead of taking his threat seriously. She took a step towards him, and another, and another. She was tempting fate, she knew that, but she knew something that he didn’t think she did.

“You aren’t going to shoot me, Rafe.” She stated, grabbing the handgun and taking it from his grasp and turning it around in her own hand, tapping his shoulder with it. “You wouldn’t want to kill me.” She then touched the gun to her own chin before taking a few steps away from him again, turning and smiling at him. “You’re not as good at hiding your feelings as you think you are, all those years ago, if I hadn’t have been with Sam I know you would have tried. Hell, you did try the second I had to break it off with Sam.” Rafe looked to the ground, keeping quiet as she then put the gun on the table.

“Even though that was fifteen years ago, I could see how deep you had already fallen.” Rafe was no longer looking angry, he was looking vulnerable. “Something like that, it stays with you forever, especially if you don’t get closure.” She knew that from personal experience, seeing Sam had ripped her heart from her chest all over again. “I’m not going to use that against you, Rafe, but you shouldn’t pretend either. You won’t shoot me, you never will. So don’t act like you’re going to.” She stood in silence, watching him carefully.

“I’ll give you one chance to switch sides, Caeli. One. Right now.” Rafe stated, walking towards her and holding onto her hand. She immediately pulled her hand from his grasp, shaking her head.

“You know I can’t do that, Nathan’s like a brother to me, I’m not even going to add Sam into that equation just yet. These people are my family, Rafe, I wish you understood what that kind of loyalty means, what it feels like to trust people with your life without any kind of money involved.” She stated, walking towards the door.

“I can’t let you leave, Caeli,” Rafe said as he picked up the gun again, pointing it at her. She rolled her eyes before turning to look at him one last time.

“You can if you can’t see me.” She told him, her eyes darkening to black as she touched the shadow on the wall. “You don’t think that eleven years of being with an Occult order wouldn’t have had an effect on me? My strength and speed, they are much better than average now, plus, they gave me the ability to manipulate darkness. To do what I like to call ‘shadow walking’. Good luck, Rafe.” She told him, her body melting to the shadow that was on the wall, disappearing from view.

Shadow-walking was strange to her, even after all these years. Her body didn’t necessarily move, but she could see where she was going, could feel herself moving along the walls, the ground, wherever a shadow was cast, she only went back to her usual body when the line of shadows ran out near the exit to the driveway.

“Shit.” She whispered, hiding behind a pillar as she saw the number of guards outside. She should have held onto Rafe’s gun. The earpiece she had taken out was still in the pocket of her romper, she placed it back into her ear, sneaking slowly around to the car as the guards walked around. She took out a few as quietly as possible

She eventually got into the car that Sully was in, taking the front seat.

“Sam and Nathan stuck in a fight?” She asked and he nodded in response, turning the car on. The rest of the escape didn’t matter, it was after they were back on the road that Caeli dared to look at the Drake brothers on the back seat, allowed herself to take in Sam’s features. He was alive, very much so, but the conversation they needed to have would be best in private. The air was awkward, heavy, in the car, she had ended things with Sam two days before the Order had taken her back… Nathan probably didn’t even know.

They made it to a hotel, one that seemed dodgy enough that Rafe wouldn’t look for them there. They booked two double rooms, Sully and Nathan shared one while Sam and Caeli were left in the other.

Caeli didn’t have the heart to argue.

She took her small bag into the room, placing it on the bed closest to the door. If they were found… she would rather be the closest, Rafe was less likely to harm her. She sat down on the mattress, a little harder than what she was used to but still better than the one that the Order had given her. Sam came in after her, seeming a little hesitant on the room situation much like she was, even though she was hiding it behind a hard exterior.

“Are you going to be alright with this or do I swap with one of the other two?” Sam asked; Caeli shook her head.

“It’s fine, Sam.” He nodded in reply, moving towards the other bed and dropping his bag on it. He took a deep breath, seeming like he was going to say something but couldn’t bring himself to. “I’m going to have a shower and get changed, then we can crack open the minibar and talk about everything. Unless you want to shower after me, of course.” She told him, grabbing some clothing from her bag and immediately walking to the bathroom. Closing the door behind her was such a final action, such a strange one. She never used to close the bathroom door, never bothered to when it had been her and Sam sharing a room. That had been a while ago, under much different circumstances.

She had a shower, the hot water nearly burning her skin, Sam followed afterwards. As she paced the room in a pair of sweatpants and an old jumper, the nerves kept building up as the water ran so loudly through the pipes, but what increased that anxiety tenfold was when that water stopped running. Her feet carried her straight to the minibar then, opening one of the small bottles of vodka and downing it.

She wasn’t ready for this.

Then again, she might never be.

“Still prefer vodka then…” Sam trailed off as he walked out of the bathroom.

“Always have, always will.” She replied, a small smile on her face, no sign of happiness accompanied it. “I like the neck tattoo.” She whispered, talking about the birds now on his neckline, above his collarbone.

“I had some inspiration.” He responded, gesturing towards her with his right hand. She instantly touched the left side of her ribcage, where a similar tattoo rested underneath her bra line. There was a moment of silence before he spoke again. “I honestly thought you were…” He couldn’t seem to bring himself to finish that sentence, she didn’t blame him.

“What made you even think that?” She asked, confused about that one point in particular, whilst she leant against the minibar, her hands gripping to the overhanging edge of the wood, her knuckles turning white from the

“Well, you said that if you didn’t come to help us you were most likely dead. You knew that the entire Panama prison idea was a bad one, you knew it would go wrong, so when you weren’t there to help us get out I just assumed that… that you were gone. I know you aren’t petty enough to let what happened between us doom Nate as well. If it was just me you might have left me to rot, but not Nate.” Sam explained, she shook her head.

“No, the Order took me back to England, they found me.”

“The one your parents freed you from?” Sam asked, pulling a packet of cigarettes out of his bag as well as his lighter.

“Yes, that same one.” She answered, watching as he pulled a cigarette out. “If you smoke in here, I will get you to swap with Nate so you and Sully can both ruin your lungs together.” She told him, he grimaced slightly before putting everything back. “So what happened? The Order told me you had died just a month after they grabbed me, I thought they were lying until they told me exactly what happened during your attempted escape, it was hard to reason against that story.”

“You aren’t the only one, I surprised Nate only three days ago.” He told her, looking at the floor.

“How did all of this happen?”

“Doctors patched me up.” He lifted his shirt to show the three scars from the bullets that had torn through his stomach. “I was left in the prison as Rafe and Nate got away. I got out not too long ago thanks to my cellmate, Hector Alcazar. In return for him helping me to get out, I need to find Avery’s treasure, to pay up.” He answered with a short, simple story. But a false one. How he got out must have been controversial to Nate and her, otherwise, he wouldn’t be lying. She had always been able to tell when he lied, it was no different after fifteen years. She pondered it for a moment, before deciding to let him go with the story. She would see how far he went with it, but she wouldn’t trust it. “What happened with you? I heard stories of an occult assassin, wouldn’t happen to be you, would it?”

“It would be me, unfortunately. The Order that my parents had belonged to was an occult one, interested in all kinds of supernatural artefacts and experiments. They had wanted me to be one of those experiments, so when they took me back that’s what they did, experimented on me. They gave me a small amount of sap from the Tree of Life in Shambala, just enough to increase my strength and speed to a supernatural, but still believable, amount. The other things they did… are less believable and a lot more painful.” She told him.

“Less believable how?”

“You saw the shadows move around me earlier tonight, I know you did.” She told him, he didn’t move but she could see it written on his face, the concern about that particular part of the night. “Darkness, they gave me control over it. Over shadows, mostly. I myself, can merge into them and move around as one.”

“Caeli, you don’t expect me to…”

He had trailed off as she closed her eyes, opening them again to be the demonic black of the shadows before the let her body melt away before reconstructing it again. Sam immediately walked over to the minibar, so she took a step away to allow him to open the door, finding a bottle of scotch and opening it, although he at least poured it into a glass before beginning to drink it, unlike Caeli who was still sipping vodka from the bottle.

“That’s the only thing they really achieved over eleven years, I then got myself out, I found Nate who was searching for the Atlantis of the Sands, which the Order was also looking for. We teamed up, we took the Order out, accidentally destroyed the city while we were at it. Katherine Marlowe, the leader of the Order drowned in quicksand, Talbot, her second in command I killed myself. He was about to kill Sully, but with my shadows I was able to scare him, with my strength and speed I was able to kill him. I held his throat in my hand, crushing it as I lifted him before I threw him to his death.” She finished, taking another swig of vodka. A few minutes of silence passed between them. Caeli ran a hand through her hair before she spoke again.

“I think that’s enough for one night.”


	4. Avery's Grave

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Caeli faces the freezing cold to help the Brothers find Avery's grave, which leads them to the next clue...

Caeli’s body shivered in the cold, the snow around them just an indicator of the bloody cold temperatures that Scotland usually bore. At least whenever she had to be within its borders. Even with the thermal layers underneath her fleece-lined denim jacket which, of _course_ , matched Sam’s, the layer of her Skins under a pair of snow pants, her fleece-lined boots… she still had a bloody beanie on. A beanie.

She was tempted to put on a pair of gloves…

Although, she was already getting enough shit from the Drake brothers for her beanie and wasn’t in the mood for anymore.

“How can someone like you, still hate the cold as much as you do?” Sam asked as she shivered once again.

“I may like darkness, Samuel, but I don’t see how that has anything to do with freezing temperatures," she snapped, her teeth near chattering.

“You should have brought another jacket if you’re that cold,” Sam responded, she shot him a glare.

“You’re lucky these boots offer warmth until -10 degrees Celsius or else I would be ripping the shoes off of your feet to get your thermal socks to put over the top of mine.” She replied, touching the gun in its holster to remind herself why she wasn’t wearing her gloves, aside from not wanting the brothers to give her more shit, she needed full control to shoot a gun with deadly accuracy, so gloveless was how she would have to stay… at least until she lost feeling to her fingertips, which could very well happen at any minute now.

At that thought she lifted her hands to her mouth, breathing into them in an attempt to warm them up.

“Well, Rafe’s definitely going all out, isn’t he?” Sam asked, changing the subject as the sound of an explosion filled the air.

“Well, they’re all concentrated around the cathedral, so that’s good because we are going to have that graveyard all to ourselves,” Nate replied as Caeli reminded herself why she was even here, in this freezing fucking place to start with. The cross of Saint Dismas held a map of this cathedral, of the cemetery, while Sam was hoping the treasure was in this cemetery, where Avery’s grave supposedly was, Caeli was more inclined to believe that it was the next clue towards the treasure… if there really was any.

Nate spoke into the walkie-talkie, addressing Sully who was on the other end about what to do with the seaplane and where to leave it. As he spoke Sam walked over to her, a concerned look on his face.

“If you’re that cold you should go back to Victor, keep warm on the plane,” Sam told her, she shook her head.

“I’m not leaving you two alone against Shoreline. There is no doubt that they have men in between here and where we need to be, you’ll die without me. I just may die of hypothermia before we actually find this grave.” She tried to joke, but he didn’t seem to find it funny.

“I’m serious, Caeli, you can’t help us if you’re frozen,” Sam told her, once again she shook her head.

“I’m fine, Sam, the only way for me to be warmer is to have a puffer jacket on and that restricts movement, so that’s not going to happen. We just need to get moving, soon, running would be preferable.” She told him, but he didn’t seem entirely convinced.

“If your lips turn blue, you’re going back to the plane.” He stated as if it was final, her eyebrows furrowed, but before she could reply Nate was already finishing his conversation with Sully and Sam had changed the subject. “Well, let’s go pay our respects to Captain Avery, huh?” Sam said before beginning to run towards where they needed to go.

Caeli focused on running as Sam and Nate talked about Rafe, and they had only been on the move for about two minutes when they came across their first sign of Shoreline and Rafe’s activities underneath a small cliff-face. A few boxes of equipment, a map of the cathedral…

“What the hell is all this?” Nathan asked as if he hadn’t seen half of the things lying around the area before.

“It’s excavation equipment,” Caeli answered bluntly, picking up a rope before putting it back down again. “Shoreline.” She added, looking at a barrel with the logo printed onto it.

“I thought they were just at the cathedral?” Nathan both asked and stated at the same time.

“Clearly not.” She responded just before a warning shout came from about thirty meters away.

“Look! They’re here!” A Shoreline mercenary shouted, prompting Caeli to immediately hide behind some of the containers of equipment, looking cautiously over the containers she could immediately see three of them, so she stood up high enough just to get an accurate shot at each of them, using only one bullet per man, straight through the brain before she hid herself again. When there were no other calls from enemy men she stood up again, this time not caring about subtlety.

“It’s okay, that’s all of them for now,” Caeli stated, the two brothers stood up slowly from behind their own container shields. “If I didn’t know any better, I would say that they were expecting us.”

“And they’re searching away from the cathedral,” Sam added, Caeli began picking up leftover ammo from the mercenaries.

“Which means we should get to the graveyard, pronto,” Nate added, already running in that very direction.

“Exactly.” Sam agreed, looking to Caeli before running after his brother, so she followed after the two. They reached another Shoreline camp area, where she picked up a rifle.

“What is this place?” Sam asked, reaching her side.

“The monks had living quarters, the main one was by the graveyard, this is the ruins.” She told him, keeping her voice quiet.

“It’s all about location, isn’t it?” He joked, she cracked a smile.

“This is a lot of Shoreline equipment,” Nathan stated, having already run around the perimeter of the camp.

“At least there’s no Shoreliners…” Sam added, Caeli glared at him.

“Great, now you’ve jinxed us.”  She said with a bored tone, grabbing a rifle as an uneasy feeling settled into her stomach. People were coming, and soon. Nate went to move a crate, most likely to help reach higher to continue moving towards the cemetery. He began pulling it towards a specific part of the ruins, where there was a hole in the roof and access to the next part of their path. She ignored them as that feeling in her stomach worsened.

“The explosion definitely came from this direction…” Had she been so out of it she hadn’t noticed one of the idiot Drake’s setting off dynamite? Probably.

“Let’s do a full sweep, hey?” A second mercenary stated, so she immediately hid behind a pile of rubble.

“Shit, watch it…” She heard Sam whisper, he was moving towards her, so she cut his journey in half by going towards him as well.

“Stay hidden, I’ll deal with them.” She stated.

“To hell you’re going to do this by yourself.” He whispered back to her, her eyes rolled.

“Watch me.” She replied, sticking her head high enough to see the mercenaries before she formulated a plan. “Nate already has two down, another three to go.” She told Sam, sneaking out from behind the ruins and jumping to the one who was closest, snapping their neck and dropping their body in the long grass to avoid detection. She hid in the grass as she crept to her next target, doing the same with them before sprinting towards the last one, taking them by surprise before she kicked them off of the cliff. After that, she turned to look towards where Sam was still hidden.

“What did I tell you?” She asked, smirking as he stood up slowly, an expression on his face she was unsure about. Nate had already made it back to the crate and was pushing it to the only room that was still intact of these living quarters, getting it inside and lining it up with the hole in the ceiling before climbing out. “After you.” Caeli motioned to Sam, who sighed before climbing out next, Caeli following close behind.

The next section of their path involved swinging from ropes, rock climbing, and more running and dealing with Shoreline Mercenaries. There was also plenty of banter between the three as if the past fifteen years had never happened. Fifteen years. The amount of time still shocked her. She was getting old, forty-one years old. Jesus Christ, she needed to retire.

“And we’re here,” Nathan stated.

“Yes, we are,” Sam replied, Caeli looking around the cemetery.

“Took a bloody lot longer than I thought it would,” Caeli added, looking at the headstones. They were looking for a specific headstone with a specific set of skull and crossbones on it.

“Welcome to the Saint Dismas dormitory, alleged final resting place of one Henry Avery,” Nathan stated, looking at his notebook.

“Still took too long to get here,” Caeli responded as she walked along a pathway, carefully taking in each tombstone. “Guys…” She trailed off, speaking loud enough for the brothers to hear her.

“What is it?” Sam asked, reaching her side first.

“I think I found it.” She stated, Nate joining them next.

“Well, the cutlasses are a match…” He trailed off, wiping off the snow covering the year on it. “So is the year… and the name. Benjamin Bridgeman.”

“Avery’s alias,” Caeli stated, realising the skull was facing the wrong way. She pushed passed Nate, touching it and turning it to face the side instead of the front. “Now it matches the sigil.” She stated, hearing mechanisms moving behind the tombstone. A staircase slowly descended into the ground, making her laugh.

“You ready for this?” Nate asked.

“Oh, I’ve been ready for a long time,” Sam replied, and the brothers immediately descended into the underground cavern. She followed a little less keenly than the other two.

“Let’s see what we got…” She whispered to herself, entering a crypt. “Are you kidding me? Why does it always have to be crypt?” She asked.

“Why hide a crypt behind a secret door?” Sam asked.

“I assume the secret door was added afterward.” Caeli replied, keeping her ‘you’re an idiot’ tone rather low.

“To hide his loot?” Sam bounced the idea off of the other two.

“I doubt his loot is in a cemetery crypt,” Caeli stated again, for maybe the third time. They followed a hallway also filled with dead bodies to see statues of three people hanging from crosses.

“Whoa, the gang’s all here,” Nate said as he came closer to the statues. “Jesus, Dismas on the left…”

“Penitent thief,” Sam stated.

“Gestas on the right.”

“Jerk thief,” Sam explained, Caeli snorted at his lack of care for Gestas’ actual title.

“Avery sure had a thing for Saint Dismas, didn’t he?” Caeli asked, not as well adept in Christianity as the Drake’s who had grown up in a Catholic boarding school.

“Well Avery fancied himself a ‘good thief’, right? Only plundered and murdered the non-British heathens.” Sam stated, having also studied pirate-lore and history he was well adept in this topic.

“Guess that’s what passed for good back then,” Nate stated, Sam shrugged his shoulders.

“Good enough.”

“At least I would have been safe then,” Caeli stated, her accent rather strong with the sentence as if to reaffirm with herself that she was indeed British and not American. Sam turned to look in her eyes, knowing she had always had trouble with her true origins.

“I suppose you would have been.” He agreed, Nate running off to find out what to do next in the crypt.

“Is this a door? Looks like a door…” Nate trailed off from the next room, so Sam and Caeli followed in.

“I don’t see a way to open it though,” Sam responded.

“What are these star symbols?”

Caeli looked to the pieces of glass in the door, then turned to look behind them. The statues…

“These are some kind of lamps.” Caeli pointed up to the objects she was talking about.

“Hey, smokey, she needs your lighter,” Nate stated, Sam groaned as he took the lighter from his pocket and threw it to Caeli who caught it and began lighting the three lamps.

“You know, that hurts my feelings,” Sam said in response to Nate’s words.

“Not as much as it hurts your lungs,” Caeli responded as she lit the lamp, fire carrying to the places

“Thank you, Father Duffy,” Sam called out after her as she began moving mechanisms to match the lines of light to the glass circles on the door. “What are you doing back there?” Sam came around to watch as she kept moving the lights.

“Connecting…” She started, moving to the last statue. “…the dots.” She finished moving the mechanism and walked back into the other room.

“It looks like a constellation,” Sam stated, lines of light connecting each glass circle to indeed make a shape that was similar to a constellation.

“Libra, the scales of justice,” Caeli stated, although pirates and Christianity were Sam’s, she had taken the time to learn the stars from Sullivan, thought it would be rather important in the future. It had, it was the only way that she and Nate hadn’t died on their way to find the Atlantis of the Sands.

“That’s an interesting choice for a bunch of pirates…” Sam trailed off.

“I think this might be a little more complicated than we first thought,” Caeli said, her voice just above a whisper as she reached for the one star that wasn’t connected to the constellation but still had light emanating from behind it. She turned it around and the door lost all light it was holding, they then slid open to reveal the next room.

“Open sesame,” Sam stated, Nate pointed a finger at him.

“Wrong treasure.”

“Get over yourselves,” Caeli said as she looked out of the blue, glass windows.

“Nice view, but no treasure though,” Sam stated, Caeli rolled her eyes.

“No, but, you see those crosses…” Nate began, so Caeli and Sam stood beside him to look out of the same section of the window. Three crosses triangulated around a cave entrance.

“The cave in the middle of them, that is where we should be going next,” Caeli stated simply, the brothers agreed with her.

“There’s one problem though…” Nate stated. “Going back that way means going to the cathedral.”

“And back towards Rafe,” Sam added, looking at Caeli carefully as if he had said something that she should be able to pick up on.

“Shit,” Nate swore, and even though Caeli was confused as to why Sam was looking at her like that she continued the conversation.

“Let’s not keep him waiting then.” After she spoke Nate began running towards the exit. “Nathan!” She shouted and the man came running back to them.

“What is it?” He asked, Caeli sighed.

“You two should stay here for ten minutes, I’ll go and take Shoreline idiots out, that way I know you’re safe. Besides, I’ll be quicker at it when I’m shadow-walking, okay? Come only after those ten minutes, you promise?” She questioned, Nathan seemed to be accepting of the plan but Sam wasn’t.

“Caels, we’re not letting you go out there by yourself to get killed-”

“Samuel, I’m not going to get myself killed. Just this once I'm asking for you to let me do this, for _your_ safety. Okay? Just meet me at the cave entrance.” She stated, he looked like he was about to argue but she gave him a pointed look to keep him quiet. “Ten minutes, you better not leave before then!” She warned, running towards the exit as she spoke, immediately melting away into one of the shadows to begin taking down Shoreline mercenaries.


	5. Bridges

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Avery's tests begin to make Caeli think there is something bigger than just treasure to be found as they progress towards the next clue...

Caeli stood at the cave entrance, blowing into her hands to warm them up. The brothers were taking too long to get to the cave, and she was sure she had taken out each Shoreliner on her way. She was tempted to go back and see if she could find them, but it took everything in her to remind herself that they were grown men and could take care of themselves. Most of the time.

“Caeli should be just here, where is she?” Caeli released a breath she hadn’t known she was holding as Sam spoke, sounding worried, Caeli couldn’t help the smile that came to her face.

“Sam, she can take care of herself.” Nate reminded his brother.

“Yeah I know, but…”

“You remember what I told you at the auction, right?”

“Yeah, she’s not the same as fifteen years ago, like how I'm not-”

“She’s a full-blown assassin now, Sam, she’s fine, she’s probably just a little further in to keep out of the storm,” Nate explained, making Caeli laugh to herself.

“That doesn’t mean I have to stop worrying about her, I mean I don’t know how you and Elena are but… I don’t think I could ever stop caring about her. I tried, I thought she was dead and suddenly she’s… _not_. I thought I’d moved on, but, apparently I just pushed it down and seeing her again has me a little fucked up.” Sam stated, and Caeli completely understood. She was in the same boat. But, it was probably best she pretended she hadn’t heard that. She waited until they reached the small alcove she was waiting in before she announced her position to them.

“You boys took your time, I was starting to get worried.” She stated, her hands in her jacket pockets in hopes the fleece lining could offer her some warmth.

“You said ‘cave entrance’,” Sam said, pointing a finger at her while his face displayed both anger and concern.

“This is the entrance, you think I was going to stand out in the snow and wind to wait for you guys? Really? Just so I could be at the very beginning of the cave for you?” She snapped, a little unappreciative of his tone, and the fact he was treating her like a child.

“Caels-”

“Let’s go, see what Avery has in store for us.” She cut Sam off, beginning to walk further into the cave and past Nate who had a confused look on his face. She kept ahead of the Drakes, walking fast enough that they wouldn’t catch up. Caeli only stopped once she reached a door, a panel next to it having a hole in it, which no doubt held the handle, but she wouldn’t be shoving her hand in that. Nathan was the next to reach the door, and he, without hesitation, shoved his hand into the hole, feeling around for the handle.

“A little slimy…” Nate trailed off, as his arm slowly went further and further into the hole just as Sam reached the door as well, avoiding eye contact with Caeli. “There’s a handle in here or something,” Nate added, Caeli tilted her head to the side, looking over the door, the floor and the ceiling to see if there were any clues that the handle could be a trap. If it was, it would be something that would cut of Nate’s appendage… could be worse.

“Well… give it a- give it a pull.” Sam said, Caeli immediately shot her eyes to the older brother.

“What?” Nate asked, making sure he had heard his brother correctly. “It could be a trap.”

“You’re already in there. What’s the worst that could happen?” Sam asked.

“Uh, I lose my hand?” Nate stated; Caeli nodded in agreement.

“But we could get you a nice hook.” She said, looking at the door again, tempted to just shadow-walk through. Sam let out a small laugh.

“Give it a pull.” Sam then told his brother, who worked up the nerve to do the said thing.

“Nice hook,” Nate whispered to himself, mocking Caeli’s idea. “All right, here we go.” He then pulled the handle, immediately the door rolled open. Nate took his hand out of the hole as it did so, wiping the slime onto Sam’s jacket.

“Really?” Sam asked rhetorically as they walked into the new room, Caeli seemed to be the first to notice the décor in the room.

“Oh, Jesus Christ…” She trailed off, running to the sign that was hanging underneath the cages hanging from the ceiling. One of them was broken, the other had a skeleton within it. She then began reading the sign out loud so the brothers could hear. “For those who prove worthy, paradise awaits… to those who prove false, behold your grim fate.” Her eyes then moved to the skeleton hanging above the sign.

“Well, I guess that Avery was a better pirate than a poet,” Sam said as he looked below the statues the stood against the wall.

“This isn’t Avery’s,” Caeli stated next, her knowledge on pirate sigils wasn’t the most expansive, but the years they had spent looking for Avery’s treasure meant that she knew this one wasn’t right. Instead of cutlasses and a skull, there was an arm holding a sword. “Look.” She stated as Sam came to stand next to her, she pointed to the sigil as Nate came up to it, shining his torch onto it.

“It’s the Rhode Island Pirate,” Sam informed them.

“Thomas Tew,” Nate added in the Pirate’s actual name.

“Yeah, but it can’t be him. This is clearly his sigil, but Tew died attacking the same treasure fleet as Avery.” Sam stated next.

“History doesn’t always speak the truth, especially when it comes to treasure and pirates. It wouldn’t surprise me if that didn’t happen.” Caeli replied, watching as Nate began walking around towards the statues.

“If this really is Tew’s mark then that means he’s involved in all of this, how?” Sam asked, warily looking to Caeli as if he wasn’t sure if he was allowed to.

“That’s a damn good question,” Nate responded as the ground shook beneath their feet, another Shoreline explosion. Caeli was processing the warning sign, the words used… _paradise._ Could it be? It couldn’t be Libertalia, it doesn’t exist, but then again Shambala, El Dorado and Iram of the Pillars were supposed to be legends and myths as well. She would keep it in mind, and if more evidence came to light she could put the idea forward then, but until then…

“So who do you think these guys are?” Nate asked as he looked up to the skeletons.

“Those who proved false,” Caeli said, not wanting to focus on it for too much longer and decided to find the way out of the room and to the next.

“I think Avery, or Tew, are just trying to scare us,” Sam stated, Caeli shook her head but stopped herself from saying anything.

“Good thing we’re jaded treasure hunters,” Nate said as Caeli began walking down a cave to find whatever their next puzzle would be. The two brothers followed her.

“That bridge looks… about as safe as the others.” Sam said as they reached another rickety, wooden bridge.

“It’s held up this long…” Caeli trailed off as she took the first step onto it, walking slowly across, still with her hands in her pockets.

“Famous last words,” Sam called after her, she smirked but continued on her way, jumping over the gap missing from the bridge and making it to the other side in one piece.

“Maybe for fat-asses like you two!” She shouted once she turned to look back at them. Nate went first, moving forward to scout the area as Caeli waited for Sam to cross. He was just about to jump over the missing section when he made a joke.

“These bridges are clearly not built to code!” He shouted, making sure that Nate would be able to hear it. Caeli groaned as she realised exactly what the response would be from the younger brother.

“Please don’t say it…” She whispered to herself.

“Sure they are, the pirate code!” She grimaced as Sam jumped and Nate said exactly what she thought he would.

“He had to say it.” She again whispered to herself, eyebrows furrowed as Sam walked the last section of the bridge.

“Making sure I got across safely?” He asked.

“Making sure it didn’t break under your immense weight. Someone would have to catch you if it did.” She told him, but she still couldn’t find it within herself to smile at the banter.

“Joking about death a bit harder now?” Sam questioned, she ignored the question, turning to where Nate had gone.

“Let’s get to your brother before he hurts himself.” She stated, following where he had gone with Sam close behind. A dangerous slippery slope and some cliff-face climbing later and she was back on solid ground, following the path laid out ahead of them to the next thing they had to solve. Nate got into the next room first, Caeli and Sam were close behind and made it just in time for Nate to step on a trip-stone, one that shut the entrance behind them.

“No, no, no…” Sam said as he tried to stop the door from closing, but failed miserably.

“I guess we won’t be getting out that way,” Caeli said with finality as she took in the mechanism on the wall in front of them. It was large, and it seemed that everything was on spinning circles which would have to line up correctly to open the next door.

“At least we didn’t get dropped in a pit or something,” Nate said optimistically, which Caeli couldn’t help but agree with. She then noticed the skeleton hanging from a hole in a stone panel, similar to the one they used before. The difference was, this one had spikes coming from the wall which was obviously a trap. Nate took the skeleton's hand out of the hole and the spikes disappeared.

“Jesus…” Sam trailed off, but Caeli was more focused on the mechanism and the fact it was moving.

“This is going to be interesting.” She said as she focused on the bucket which was making its way to an easy to reach distance thanks to the turning mechanisms.

“It’s a pretty elaborate test… or trial,” Sam stated, Caeli mumbled her agreement, grabbing the bucket once it was low enough.

“I don’t think that guy had it quite right.” She said, looking back to the skeleton which was now slumped on the floor, Nate throwing the forearm back to the rest of the bones.

“Then let’s do better,” Sam said, looking to Caeli as she walked around with the bucket, finding a small body of water. She jumped over the small cliff-face, filling the bucket up and handing it up to Nate who was waiting at the top before taking it back to the wall. She attempted jumping out but was just a few inches short of being able to reach the top.

“Can I have some help out of here?” She asked, Sam popped over the edge.

“Bit short are you?” He asked.

“Don’t rub it in my face.” She warned as he held a hand over the edge, which she jumped up to, gripping his forearm as he did with hers. There was a split-second where time stopped, where she was staring into his eyes and him into hers as she hung so similarly as to how they had done many times before. He then pulled her up to a sufficient height for her to place her forearm over the edge and helped her up to standing. Still holding each other’s forearms, they were exceptionally close, a few inches away from each other. She took a deep breath, trying to look away from his eyes but failing.

“I think we need to talk a little bit more, about everything.” He whispered, she nodded in agreement.

“Guys, the bucket worked,” Nate said, and Caeli took that as the opportune moment to pull away from Sam.

“Well, let’s see what these wheels do.” She said as she walked over to newly revealed mechanisms she guessed were used to control the wheels on the wall. There were four circles of light now on the wheels, which she guessed would need the crosses and the bucket in. The bucket would most likely need to get to the top circle of light, the one separated from the other three at the bottom. “Which crosses are for each person, you know, Jesus, Dismas…” She asked and Nate pointed to each of the three while giving her the respective name. She nodded before she began moving the wheels, once each of the crosses were in their proper positions and the bucket at the top she stepped away.

“Let’s see if that works,” Sam said as if he had some part to play in this whole thing.

“ _Let’s_? So you’re going to pull the switch?” Caeli asked as she walked over to the hole in the stone panel. She put her hand into the hole, ignoring as Sam began to protest, but she felt the handle and pulled hard, she didn’t even flinch when sounds of movement began emanating from the wall, but she hadn’t been spiked so she assumed the puzzle was solved correctly.

“Caeli, I think you got it,” Nate stated, she took a few steps away from the wall to watch as the bucket tipped over at the top, releasing all of the water from inside of it and following a wooden channel to the door, allowing it to unlock and roll open.

“So if that was a test, what do you suppose they were testing exactly?” Sam asked.

“That whoever is attempting to enter has a working brain,” Caeli stated simply.

“It’s not a hard test,” Sam added, she shook her head.

“Do you really think it’s going to be the only one?” She asked him, watching as Nate ran ahead and stood on the edge of another cliff. Sam and Caeli walked to stand next to him.

“As I live and breathe, would you look at this place,” Sam whispered, and while they took in the beauty Caeli was already trying to figure out a way across the massive ravine in front of them.

“Judging from the infrastructure over there, I would have to say that we’re directly under the cathedral, which means at any moment a misplaced explosion could have this entire area collapsing on itself,” Caeli stated. “We should move quickly.” She added, running back and taking a different path, only just aware of the brothers following her.

Once again the path involved a lot of swinging from ropes, trusting exceptionally average looking wooden structures to hold their weight and finding bridges that were no longer intact. They then came across a hole in the wall as they stood against it, the ledge the three squeezed onto barely wide enough to hold them all.

“Nadine and Rafe…” Caeli whispered as they heard something from the other side of the wall.

“Rafe, any luck with the manuscripts?” Nadine asked.

“Can we have a minute?” Rafe asked, speaking of the mercenary who was receiving orders from Nadine. Clearly, he left as the two then continued their conversation.

“Did you hear? They found a whole annexed area under the cathedral.” Nadine stated, Caeli looked to Nate, surprised he was keeping quiet for this long.

“I did, have you seen it?” Rafe asked in response.

“No, why?” She responded.

“Because there wasn’t much left after they’d finished ‘finding’ it,” Rafe responded, he was pissed, to say the least, about the explosives in use.

“My men have been a bit liberal with the dynamite-”

“They’re like a hundred well-armed bulls in a china shop.”

“But they’ve made more progress in two days than we’ve made in months.”

“Progress? I can’t analyse rubble.” There was a slight pause before Nadine responded.

“Okay, okay.”

“Thank you.”

“I’ll let them know to give you a heads up before they do anything drastic.” Rafe didn’t seem to like that idea.

“Or you can tell them to sit tight until I analyse the few clues that haven’t been blown up.”

“No, we can’t sit around waiting any longer.”

“All due respect, I think I have a bit more experience with this sort of thing than you do.”

“We tried things your way.”

“Bullshit. You’ve been wanting to level this place ever since we got here.”

“No, I wanted to steal that cross long before it ever even made it to the auction. That same auction where I couldn’t have my men around to deal with any surprises.”

“The auction was the cleanest way to get the cross-”

“But, instead of going with my gut, I listened to you. Now, we have competition.”

“Well, I didn’t think they’d show up.” There was another pause.

“Or maybe, you wanted to draw them out.”

“Why? Why the hell would I do that?”

“Because you think you need them.” Nadine paused in the middle of what she was saying. “And maybe you do. Point is, I'm done trying to do things the clean way. If the treasure is here, we’ll find it, and if it’s not… well, maybe it’s time to move on, huh?” There was another pause, Caeli guessed that Rafe was giving Nadine a disapproving look due to her words. “Hey… it’s not personal.”

“Of course,” Rafe stated in response, although his tone didn’t seem to match his words.

“I’ll let you know if anything turns up,” Nadine said before leaving the room, at least that was what Caeli guessed since there was the sound of the door opening and closing.

“Let’s get moving before they blow that treasure to bits,” Nate stated once it was clear there was nothing else they could listen in on.

“Or they start making out.” Sam offered a different end to the situation, making Nate laugh, but it wasn’t enough to bring the emotion of humour to Caeli’s face.

“Do you think she was right?” Caeli asked, the two men looked to her in confusion. “About wanting to draw us out? It wasn’t just you, Rafe was looking to get me as well. All of us.”

“As long as he doesn’t get the upper hand, who cares?” Nate asked as if that was a reasonable response. “It doesn’t matter.” He added, Caeli shook her head.

“It kinda does, to me at least. Not that either of you seem to care about your lives or anything.”


	6. Those Who Prove Worthy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Caeli and the Drakes find out the next step to finding Avery's treasure

If Caeli was truly honest, she was becoming rather sick of swinging on ropes and climbing cliff-faces, it was starting to become ridiculous, the amount that they had done so in the past couple of hours. They were looking for treasure, not trying to make the world record for ‘most dangerous way to make it across a cave chamber’.

A missing test was their biggest challenge, the flooring of it entirely fallen into the ocean that breathed at the bottom of that specific chamber. They were lucky they survived that death trap, one wrong move and they would have fallen to their deaths. Not that it mattered to the Drakes, they had made it into the final chamber, the final test.

At least that’s what she bloody well hoped at this stage.

Especially since there was a coin sitting in her hand and a map of Madagascar illuminated on the ground around them. That seemed pretty final to her, at least.

“So we came all the way to Scotland, to need to go to Africa?” She whispered to herself, almost in disbelief. All this wasted time…

“It’s Madagascar,” Sam stated the obvious as they all looked to the ground.

“Look, the star right here.” Nate pointed to the floor, Caeli walked over to look at the circle of glass on the floor.

“That’s King’s Bay,” Sam stated.

“Yes, it is,” Nate responded, making Sam laugh humourlessly.

“Son a bitch is screwing with us.” He stated as if the other two didn’t already know.

“What are you talking about?” Nate asked, well, apparently he didn’t know.

“Avery, he’s screwing with us,” Sam explained. “This was supposed to be it, so where’s the goddamn treasure, huh? I mean King’s Bay, great, but what’s next? The North Pole? Outer space?” Sam kept changing looks between Nate and Caeli, although his eyes tended to linger on the latter.

“ _For those who prove worthy, paradise awaits_ …” Caeli repeated the first words from the horribly written poem by Thomas Tew. “This wasn’t about the treasure.” She stated.

“He… he was recruiting,” Nate added, seeing where she was going with this.

“Who was-“

“Avery.” Caeli cut Sam’s idiotic question off, by now the three should know which son of an ass they were talking about. “He was recruiting.”

“Recruiting for what?” Sam asked and she shook her head, she was just about to say that she thought this may have something to do with Libertalia before they were cut off by one of the cave’s walls imploding on them, a few Shoreliner and Nadine walked through the now gaping hole, the mercenary aiming a semi-automatic gun towards them.

“You three are very, very noisy,” Nadine said, explaining how they had been found. They probably should have watched their volume. “Guns on the floor, slowly.” Caeli hated putting her handgun and the rifle she had taken from the Shoreline camp on the ground, but then again, she could probably get through this without them. “I still owe you from last time,” Nadine said, facing Nathan as she spoke.

“Throwing me out a window didn’t do it for you?” Nathan asked in reply.

“What the hell did you do?” Caeli hissed through her teeth at the brother.

“Fought, at the auction.” He whispered back to her.

“You have got to be kidding me.” She finished, her eyes dangerously dark as she turned to look at Nadine again who was grabbing a hand-held radio to let Rafe know their position.

“Rafe. Rafe, come in.” She stated.

“I'm at the graveyard,” was the reply given over the device. “Nadine, they were here.”

“Yeah, I'm looking at them right now,” Nadine responded.

“What? Where are you?”

“Come back to the cathedral. Follow the holes.” Nadine explained.

“I’m on my way, and for God’s sakes please don’t shoot them yet.”

“Might want to hurry, then.” That ended that small interaction. “King’s Bay…” Nadine trailed off, looking at the ground and seeing what they had. The glass circle on the ground pointing to the location of whatever comes next.

“Yeah, but um… where, in King’s Bay?” Sam asked as if this was a two-way conversation.

“That’s a very good question, Sam. I think they’ll need that cross over there to figure it out.” Caeli continued.

“But, there are only three people here that can tell you how to use it.” Sam finished.

“Let me guess, you three?” Nadine asked.

“More or less,” Caeli replied, a smirk on her face.

“And, if you wanna to leave it to Rafe you’re going to be waiting a long time,” Nate added.

“Sorry boys, the only one that’s useful out of you three is the one in the middle,” Nadine stated, gesturing to Caeli who was between the brothers. “Besides, I'm not here to negotiate.” She then looked to a second Shoreliner who had entered the cave. “Bring me the crucifix.”

“It’s not a crucifix,” Nate stated.

“What?” Nadine questioned.

“Well, technically a crucifix refers to a cross that… you know what, never mind.” Nate realised it wasn’t worth the explanation, but that meant the distraction was over, and Nadine figured out why they had told her to get the cross.

“Don’t touch it!” She shouted, but she was too late, the Shoreliner already had the cross in the air. The floor immediately fell out from underneath them, well at least in the circle that the scales were sitting on, so a majority of the floor. The Shoreliner who grabbed the cross fell to his death, Nadine barely managed to jump and grip onto the edge. “Shoot them!” She shouted, and more Shoreline men filed into the room, each with a gun, each shooting directly towards them. She melted to the shadows, sure that Sam and Nate were hidden behind stone barricades. The ceiling then started to collapse as well, but it wasn’t enough to keep her from taking out three men before going back to Sam and Nate to get out of the cavern.

Of course, though, Nate fell from the level they were on to a ledge hidden beneath them. So they would have to wait until he found a way up, which meant that Sam and Caeli had to take out the other men.

“Get a gun, I’ll go with the shadows,” Caeli stated simply, once again melting away and taking out Shoreline men one by one. Nate eventually made it to the surface again, taking out one of the last two Shoreliners as Sam took out the second. They each grabbed a gun, readying themselves for what was to come, which happened to be a few more people at the exit they had planned on going through.

Well, until a section of the ceiling fell to fill in the hole. They were temporarily safe from Shoreliners, but they also temporarily had no way of getting out of the still-collapsing cavern.

“Now what?” Sam asked as a different section of the ceiling fell, revealing daylight.

“Up there! You guys use your rope!” Caeli shouted, hearing gunfire from where they were going to go and became a shadow once more, getting to the men that were now shooting at the brothers and killing them before the Drakes even made it to solid ground.

“We really kicked the hornet's nest, didn’t we?!” Sam shouted as they began running to find a way out.

“Kicked it, punched it, set it on fire!” Nate added on, they came across what seemed to be an entire army of Shoreliners as they made it closer to escaping the damned cathedral.

“God damn it, Nate, I can hear the fireworks from here. What the hell is going on?” Sully’s voice came from the radio in Nate’s pocket, he immediately grabbed it out to respond.

“Long story; short version is, get us the hell out of here!” Nate responded as they continued running, a small break in the fight.

“Yeah, I figured. Hold tight, I’ll be there as soon as I can.” Sully replied as Caeli ran ahead, not liking what she found, which happened to be a lot of gunfire thanks to a bloody machine gun. The brothers eventually reach her, all hiding behind solid barricades.

“Can you take that thing out?” Sam asked, looking at her, she peeked around the edge of the pillar she was behind to look at where she was heading. She didn’t answer his question, instead immediately melting away and travelling to the machine gun. She surprised the person behind its shield and snapped their neck before taking his position and using the gun against the Shoreliners, getting rid of them quickly as the brothers took out any strays.

“That’s it! Let’s keep it moving!” Sam shouted, so Caeli jumped away from the machine gun and began running behind the brothers. They faced a lot more men, snipers and more dangerous chasm crossings before they were able to reach the safety of Sully’s seaplane.

Caeli sat in the cockpit with a blanket around her body, her clothes soaking wet from the short swim they had to endure to get to the plane. Her body was shivering, her lips blue, but she wouldn’t let either of the brothers touch her for their body heat. She was far too angry to even think about it.

“Well, that was a close one…” Nate stated as he stood between Caeli and Sully in the front of the plane.

“They shot up my goddamned plane,” Sully responded.

“We’re fine, thanks,” Sam interjected.

“How soon can you get us to Madagascar?” Nate then asked, there was a slight pause as Sully processed what he had just been asked.

“No treasure then.” He came to the correct conclusion.

“Not yet,” Nate answered.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, look…” Sam said, holding out the singular coin taken from the scales. “We’re rich.”

“Jesus… suppose it’s a start.” Sully admitted as he took the coin from Sam’s hand to inspect it himself. “And you think the rest is in Madagascar?”

“There was a chamber back there with a giant map of Madagascar on the floor, so, yeah, it’s probably there,” Nate answered.

“This is beginning to smell a whole lot like a wild goose, kid,” Sully stated, and Caeli spoke up for the first time since entering the plane.

“Thank you for having some sense, Sully.” She said, her eyes looking at the sky ahead of them, not once wavering from their focus.

“Look, the treasure was never in Scotland, okay?” Nate argued.

“Then what was the point of all that, huh? Of the Saint Dismas cross?” Sam asked.

“Look, it’s like I said, I think Avery was recruiting people, and Caeli agrees with me on that point,” Nate added, even though Caeli didn’t even move at the mention of her name. “The cross was an invitation, the caves were just some sort of… initiation.”

“Oh, so we all passed, huh? Congrats Victor, we get eye patches and parrots now.” Sam said, fuelling Caeli’s anger.

“I don’t get it, why the hell would you go through all that bother to weed out a few people?” Sully asked next.

“To protect himself.” Nate started, and although it made sense it didn’t seem to be enough of a reason to Caeli. “Look, Avery was the most wanted man in the world at that time. He had to enlist people he could trust in order to keep their treasure secret.”

“What do you mean ‘their’ treasure?” Sam asked so Nate turned to face him.

“Just, think about this, Thomas Tew was a successful pirate in his own right. What would he possibly gain from joining Avery? I think Avery only sent out those crosses to other wealthy pirates like himself. What if they pooled and hid all their treasure together?”

“That would make the Gunsway haul look like chump change,” Sam said.

“Exactly.”

“Okay, so where exactly in Madagascar are we going?” Sully asked next.

“King’s Bay, it was an old pirate haven back in Avery’s time,” Sam replied.

“I know it well, it’s a big place. Anything more specific?” Sully asked next, Caeli took the coin from his hand.

“This is the only clue we have.” She answered, her voice barely above a whisper. “Especially since the map chamber collapsed around us.” She held it up, looking at the depictions on both sides. “There’s a volcano on this, does that help?” She asked Sully, handing the coin to Nate.

“Huh… there’s a volcano near King’s Bay.” He answered her. “Which means we need to get a move on.”


	7. Rain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we find out how Sam and Caeli first met...

Reaching King’s Bay seemed to take an age, but Caeli was glad that the first thing they did was find a hotel to stay in and book a room. Once again they had booked two double rooms, and once again she was sharing with Sam.

“You going to tell me why you haven’t really spoken since we left the cathedral?” Sam asked once they were alone. She began taking a few things out of her bag, the clothes she would wear for whatever adventuring they would be doing tomorrow, her notebook, a pen and a handgun.

“Are you going to tell me why you feel the need to risk all of our lives for this?” She responded. “You do realise we almost died, back in Scotland, right? That we were almost murdered at the auction before that?” She asked him, he suddenly went quiet, no ‘my life is in danger’, no ‘Alcazar will kill me’… nothing. “I haven’t spoken because I'm pissed off, you are putting our lives in danger, and when things didn’t go how you wanted them to, you took it out on us. That’s not okay.” She told him, turning back to her bag.

“I'm sorry, I just… I don’t know.” Sam tried to reply.

“That’s not good enough, Samuel.” She responded bluntly, there was silence for a moment.

“I don’t know what you want me to do-”

“I want you to think about what you’re doing here, what we’re doing here, and really think about whether the unavoidable danger is truly worth it. The last time you went after this treasure, you got shot in the stomach and we all thought you had died, I was captured by the Order and your brother barely escaped with his life.” She told him. “I don’t think you’ve processed all of that information or you just don’t care. Aside from that fact, we are both over forty now, we’re getting a bit old for this shit, Sam.”

“Sully is-”

“I don’t give a shit about Sully.” Caeli cut him off, turning to face him once more. Her striking grey eyes were drilling into his very soul. “I’m going to have a shower before the shitshow that’s going to happen tomorrow, while I do so I would like for you to think about everything that I’ve said.” She told him, grabbing her towel and walking to the bathroom and closing the door, a shaky breath escaping her lips before she closed her eyes.

She turned the taps on and ended up sitting on the bathroom floor, listening to the rhythmic fall of water. Rain, the sound reminded her of rain, and whenever she heard rain she was reminded of the first time she had met Sam.

*

_ The echo of rainfall consumed Caeli’s ears as she crept through the museum hallways, a gun loaded in her chest holster, in case of emergency. Sullivan had asked her to come here, to steal an artefact that was on temporary display, a musical trinket that was supposedly owned by the Romanoff’s. It was made of pure gold and would be worth a lot of money at a black market auction, they were going to go 50/50 on the profits. _

_ But the place was too quiet, the guards nowhere to be found. There was no noise to indicate any kind of movement aside from the rain on the roof, that set her on edge, taking out her gun and taking the safety off. Something was very wrong. _

_ She looked down a hallway, seeing feet poking out of a doorway. Someone else was here, someone had already gotten to what she was here for, and they seemed to be a bloody amateur. She picked up her pace then, instead of focusing on making no noise she began running towards the room she needed to get to, slowing down only once she was close to the correct area of the museum. _

_ She held the gun down to the floor as she touched the wall, peeking around the corner into the room she needed to get into. There was a young man, maybe 19 or 20, standing in front of the artefact she was supposed to be grabbing. He had dark hair, a similar colour to the boy that Sullivan had taken in just about a year ago. She walked silently through the room, creeping up behind him with her gun aiming towards his head. _

_ “Step away from the artefact.” She stated, her finger resting on the trigger as the other person turned to face her. _

_ “Can’t do that, sorry.” He stated. _

_ “And why might that be?” Caeli asked next, holding the handgun steady. _

_ “I need to make some money here-” _

_ “What’s your name?” _

_ “Samuel?” He stated although he was kind of questioning what his own name was. _

_ “Who sent you?” She asked next, taking a few more steps towards him, looking to the trinket for a split second before looking back to him. _

_ “Not important.” He responded, not seeming alarmed by the weapon pointed to him. _

_ “Move.” She repeated, but he shook his head. “Move or I will make you move.” She told him, he stood still as a rock, his hands in his pockets as they had been since she had walked into the room. He suddenly moved, picking a gun from his pocket and aiming it towards her, but he still moved too slow for her. _

_ She closed the gap between them as he raised his arm, ducking underneath his hand and grabbing his wrist, twisting the gun from his grip before he could shoot and then knocked him to the ground. He was locked to the ground with one of her knees on his chest, her other knee on his right arm, and her hand holding down his left. Her forearm was against his throat, her face hovering just above his. _

_ “Why couldn’t you just move?” She asked, he smirked at her. _

_ “If I had, we wouldn’t be like this, would we?” He questioned, she rolled her eyes. _

_ “You’re lucky I didn’t kill you.” She whispered, staring directly into his pale blue-grey eyes. _

_ “Give it time.” _

_ “You’re a bit overconfident if you think I’m gonna stick around you at all, to even get the opportunity to kill you again.” She told him, putting the safety back on the pistol and putting it back in its holster. “One wrong move and I will kill you with my bare hands.” She warned him. _

_ “Fair enough.” He replied as she stood up and finally took another look at the trinket she was meant to be stealing. The glass case had a lock on it, so she grabbed her tools and began picking the lock, it popped open before she took the artefact and closed the case once again, Samuel still laying on the ground. _

_ “What the hell are you doing?” She asked him. _

_ “You said no wrong moves.” He answered with humour in his tone, he slowly sat up as she shook her head. She used the sleeve of her denim jacket to clear her fingerprints from the glass and began walking out. “Where are you going?” Samuel asked, Caeli turned back to look at him, holding her hands out at her sides. _

_ “Well, I’m not staying here for a guard to find me. It’s probably a good idea for you to leave too.” She told him, tucking the artefact into her pocket. She turned back around to walk out the entrance. As she did she bumped into one of the guards… “Hi.” She stated sweetly with a smile on her face. The guard was about to say something but couldn’t do so as she punched him in the throat. Caeli then twisted around the man, her back against his and wrapped her arm around his neck behind her, pulling him over her body as she knelt over. As he lay in shock she punched his temple, knocking him out. _

_ Instead of bothering to hide the unconscious man she took off down the hallway to find her way out, aware that Samuel was following her but not particularly caring. Maybe the extra person will be useful if they encounter anyone else, maybe. Somehow, they both made it out without too much of a hassle, she was about to run into the night when Samuel grabbed onto her wrist. _

_ “Don’t fucking touch me.” She turned towards him, a killer look in her pale grey eyes. _

_ “I need that bloody, musical, fucking thing.” He told her. _

_ “I’ve already taken you down once tonight, I don’t think you need me to do it again to prove a point.” She hissed through her teeth, her anger flaring at the fact he was still touching her. He dropped her wrist, his hands in the air. _

_ “Fine, fine. Just, I need that fucking trinket. My brother and I-” _

_ “Who sent you after this?” She asked, holding the artefact in the air, Samuel didn’t respond. “This isn’t something a conventional thief would go after, few know what this is worth at auction. I’ll ask you one last time, who sent you after this?” There was a moment of silence before he groaned in response. _

_ “Victor Sullivan, I fucking hate the basta-” _

_ “You’re that kid’s brother, aren’t you?” She cut him off. _

_ “Kid? You mean Nate, right?” _

_ “If that’s the Drake kid that Sully met in Cartegena, yes, I’ve met the boy once.” She ran a hand through her hair. “He set this up, set us up to meet.” She whispered to herself, although Samuel apparently heard her. _

_ “What?” _

_ “Sullivan set us up, I'm going to kill him when I see him next.” She stated, throwing the artefact to Samuel, which he luckily caught. There was a moment of silence between them as she actually studied his features. He was attractive, she guessed, it wasn't very often she met people her age in this line of work so it was pleasant to do so. _

_ “Can I know what your name is?” He asked her. _

_ “Why should I tell you that?” She questioned, raising an eyebrow. _

_ “You know mine.” He replied, looking at the sky before looking back at her. “Plus, I think you're kind of cute.” He added; as he spoke she tucked a few loose hairs behind her heavily pierced ears. She weighed the pros and cons of telling him her name but figured if he asked Sully he would find out anyways. _

_ “My name is Caeli Porter, it's not necessarily nice to meet you.” She told him, watching his face fall from hopeful to disappointed. _

_ “I've worked with worse before…” He trailed off as if he would be able to win her over. _

_ “You're not working with anything, so don't get any ideas.” She stated as she began walking down the street. _

_ “Too late, Caels.” He stated from behind her as he began to follow her. _

_ “Call me ‘Caels’ again and I'll shoot you in the balls.” Samuel caught up to her just as she finished her sentence, they looked into each other's eyes for a moment,  her signature glare still prominent on her face as he smirked. _

_ “Feisty.” _

*

What she would give to go back and start over, to relive every moment and make sure that everything that went horribly wrong didn't. Tears glistened in her eyes as she imagined the life they could have had but were fated to never grasp.

She wished that she could have covered her tracks better; if she hadn’t ever been captured none of this would be happening. If she had just been more careful…

No, this was not her fault.

It was, but there was nothing she could have done differently, and that was what truly ruined her.


	8. Reflection

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sam and Caeli split from Nate and Sully, and with a reflection into the past we find out more of Sam and Caeli's story...

“Splitting up was a bad idea, but I'm sure you know that!” Caeli shouted as they began working their way through crowds to reach their tower, Sam made sure he could keep an eye on her greying, brown hair.

“But it’s the quickest way!” He shouted back, holding a hand out towards her which she hesitated to grasp. “I don’t want to lose you in the crowd!” He explained, so she held his hand with a groan, and  _ that look _ on her face. She felt something was off, he could tell from her expression alone.

“Somethings wrong, Sam!” She shouted to him, so he stopped walking for two seconds, taking in what she said.

“What’s wrong?!”

“I don't know yet!” She answered honestly, holding eye contact with him in order to make him truly feel the weight of what she was feeling, she had always done that to him. However, her instincts had always been accurate, when she felt they were in danger they usually were, so he knew that this was serious.

“Tell me if that feeling gets worse!” He shouted back, continuing to make his way through the crowd while holding tightly onto her hand.

“As if you would listen to me…” She trailed off, looking behind them just to make sure no Shoreline men were following them. Sam didn't reply to her, knowing it was best to keep from arguing with her right now.

Once they were inside the tower they found nothing that could be of use to them, but after a call from Sully they found out that it was indeed the other tower which held the next clue.

“What do we do now then?” She questioned.

“Sit and wait I guess.” He told her, she nodded in reply, taking up a spot on a bench and leaning her elbows onto her knees. He took up space next to her, listening carefully to her breathing. The pace of how she breathed usually gave away how she was feeling, he never knew how to explain it, it just did. Right now, from that observation alone, he knew she was in the midst of being angry, annoyed and worried all at the same time.

Not a good mixture and he knew that from experience.

“You were with Nate when he found Iram of the Pillars… what was that like?” Sam asked her, not wanting to sit in heavy silence with her.

“Um… terrifying if I'm honest.” She answered, playing with her hands.

“Nate, he said-”

“I don't care what Nate said, we almost died in the desert, we had no supplies, we barely survived the plane crash. He probably didn't tell you that part, how we hung from the same parachute as the plane that was being flown out to the Order with supplies crashed because we had a gunfight on board.” She told him, still staring at her fidgeting hands.

“No, he didn't.”

“Didn't tell you how we were so dehydrated that we had started hallucinating? That we barely made it to an abandoned city and where we were found by the Order who tried their best to kill us? That we were swarmed by spiders twice the size of our heads more than once? That we were drugged to turn on each other? That we almost died escaping the city as it collapsed?” She asked him, with his focus completely on her he could see the tears building in her eyes. She was going to cry. “I could have died and we would never have seen each other again.” She added with a whisper, dropping her head into her hands.

“I…” Sam didn’t know what to say, and that was a rare feat indeed, although it mostly seemed to happen around her.

“And you’ve put us right back into that danger…” She whispered. “I just got you back Sam, I don’t want to lose you again.” She added, once again in a whisper as he looked to her feet, a single drop of water darkening the sandstone floor between her shoes. Sam just sat in silence, not having any idea of what to do. Maybe distracting her would be best…

“Do you remember when we had that job in London?” He asked her, she took a deep breath.

“Of course I do…” She trailed off, curious as to where he was going with his question.

“That was the best few days I've ever had.” He told her. “Whenever I was… in a dark place, in Panama, I would always think back to then. It was one of the easiest jobs we've ever done.”

“Sully made sure it was, you know he had been trying to play matchmaker with us from the Romanoff music box.” She stated.

“Well, I'm glad it worked.”

“You're glad there was a pool at the motel.”

“Obviously, that's where we first…”  _ Kissed _ . He had wanted to say it, but for some reason couldn't do it.

“I loved that night, every part of it. How easy it was to get that artefact from that old crone, how much time we had left over… the fact the pool was heated.” Caeli started, sitting upright again with a small smile on her face.

“It wasn't my idea to go swimming.” Sam reminded her, she shook her head.

“I know, that was entirely my idea.” She admitted in response, and Sam was just glad to see her relatively happy again. “Besides, what else were we going to do? Get drunk off the minibar?”

“We did that after we got back from the pool…”

“Shut up, Samuel.” She told him, and that brought a smile to his face too. 

“We did.” He replied with a shrug, shuffling in the seat again.

“I'm just disappointed that the water ruined a perfectly good pair of underwear…” She trailed off, and she wasn't wrong. The water had been so chlorinated that the white underwear she had been wearing eventually stained green. The mental image of that alone was something that had helped him through many lonely nights, not that he would tell her that.

“I'm disappointed that you thought the best way to get close to me was to dunk me under the water.” He stated, trying to clear his mind of the image.

“Well, I was sick of waiting for you to make a move.” She responded. “Honestly, there was months worth of built-up tension, I had to put an end to it since you apparently wouldn't.”

“Have you met you? You were out of my league, there was no hope for me…”

“Out of your league? Obviously.” She didn't try to correct him or make him feel better about that fact. “But there was clearly hope for you, look at where it got us.”

“One thought dead for fifteen years and the other with the ability to shadow-walk,” Sam responded.

“Mm, but we managed to find each other again,” Caeli added, her eyes watching his face carefully. “Have you thought about all of this, as I asked you too?” She questioned, but before he could reply his phone began ringing.

“It's Nate.” He explained before picking up the phone and answering any and all questions about pirates and sigils that Nate had.

Meanwhile, Caeli's mind was still stuck in the past. Her memories moving from that night in England to one in Brazil two weeks later.

***

_ “You know, if you don't shut up soon, I will cut your tongue out,” Caeli whispered, annoyed by Sam and his tendency to talk without stopping. _

_ “What? It's my talent.” He replied but she shook her head in disappointment. “So now you're giving me the motherly ‘disappointed head shake’?” _

_ “And you would know about that, how?” She questioned, a sly way of saying he wouldn't know what that was like since his mother had passed away at an early age. _

_ “Got plenty of them from the Sisters…” He trailed off. _

_ “Okay, now shut up,” Caeli told him, watching their target carefully. Another night of recon was almost done, tomorrow they would break into the house and steal the Francis Drake journals that had somehow made their way here. The elderly man went to bed, the light turning off for the final time that night. _

_ “Can we go now?” Sam groaned, clearly bored. _

_ “Five more minutes. I need to make sure he's actually asleep first.” She told him. _

_ “Why?” He questioned. _

_ “Because for the last three nights he has gone to bed at the exact same time, I'm just making sure it wasn't a weird coincidence.” She answered once she felt like they had been waiting long enough and nothing else happened inside the chateaux she turned the car on and began driving back to the hotel they were staying in. _

_ “Caels,” Sam stated to gain her attention once they were inside their room. _

_ “What?” She asked, the roll of her eyes almost reflected in her tone of voice. _

_ “It's been two whole weeks…” He trailed off. _

_ “Since what?” _

_ “Since we, you know, kissed in the pool. Or rather, made out heavily in the pool.” Sam explained. _

_ “And?” _

_ “We haven't even spoken about it, what that means, what we should do about it, what-” _

_ “Samuel, we have a job we need to focus on. This can wait until later.” She stated, but he shook his head. _

_ “Nope, not going to happen this time. You've already avoided this three times-” _

_ “We were drunk, Sam, it was a once off, don't get any ideas.” She lied. Yes, they had been drunk, but she didn't want it to be a once off, and she definitely wanted him getting some ideas. _

_ “Caeli-” _

_ “It didn't mean anything.” She cut him off, staring directly into his eyes. Sometimes she wished she wasn't such a good liar. _

_ “You know what, Porter, I think you're trying to push me away.” He told her, she laughed. _

_ “I couldn't do that if I bloody well tried, have you met you?” She joked, but he was still serious about this. _

_ “You're the one who made the move on me, not the other way around.” He stated like it was supposed to be a big point in the argument. _

_ “I was drunk, Sam.” She stated simply. _

_ “Not that drunk that you didn't know what you were doing.” He tried to defend his theory. “If you hated it that much then why did you…” _

_ “Did I what?” _

_ “Hold me so tight?” He grimaced as he spoke, realising that wasn't exactly how he'd wanted to say it. _

_ “Oh my god, you sound like a teenage girl.” Caeli joked, but Sam tried one more tactic. _

_ “I might, but only because I really fucking like you, okay? I don't know how else to say it, that night, that kiss, might have meant nothing to you but it meant a shit tonne to me, okay?” Well, he had started swearing which meant he was truly invested in what he was saying. “If you just used me, then fine, whatever, just don't lie to yourself about it.” He told her, moving away to get a drink of water. _

_ “I didn't use you, Sam.” She told him, sighing. _

_ “Then what did you do? Because that's certainly what it feels like.” _

_ “I… I'm… I was raised as an assassin, feelings weren't really prioritised, nor were they welcomed. In this line of work having feelings for someone can be as dangerous as not having a weapon against someone who has one. It can get you killed if you aren't careful. It's best we leave feelings out if this, Sam if nothing else then for your brother's safety.” Caeli explained. _

_ “So you are pushing me away?” _

_ “For your safety, Sam.” _

_ “There is no safety in what we do, Caeli.” He had a point but she needed to stand by hers. Even if she was finding it increasingly difficult as he walked towards her. Although he'd never had a problem flirting with her, it had mostly been for fun, to joke around, but when it came to this kind of stuff… she could tell he wasn't very good at it, if from nothing else than from the way his hands were shaking. _

_ “I know, but this is one way to make sure there is that extra level of security. This relationship should stay platonic.” She told him, but he took her hand in his. She didn't pull away. _

_ “Do you want this or not?” He asked her, she swallowed hard. _

_ “Of course I do, but-” _

_ “Fuck the rest, if it's what you want then do it.” He cut her off of making excuses, she sighed, taking her hand away from his. She stepped back, processing everything one more time. She wanted to be with Sam, she wanted him safe. If they were together they would always be at each other's sides, she could keep him safe. Samuel turned away from her, thinking that the distance she put between them was enough to shut down any thoughts of a relationship. _

_ At least until she closed the gap between them, turned him around and kissed him hard. _

_ The kiss was returned with just as much force from Sam, his hands in her hair as she gripped onto his shirt. Without the alcohol in her system, she was able to fully feel what was happening between them, how much it meant to her to have someone she trusted enough to let them touch her like this. _

_ They broke apart only to meet again, and it was just as desperate as the first time. Maybe even more, since her actions had shown him that she felt for him what he did for her. _

_ She could feel every part of her body, his touch on her alighting something that forced her to sense everything. The slight coolness of the air on her legs, the texture of her clothing against her skin… she felt truly alive for the first time in her life. _

_ She knew this was right, she could feel it, never had she ever kissed someone before and felt that. _

_ That was why when his hands brushed along her skin underneath her shirt, she let him take the item of clothing off of her body. _


	9. Towers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Caeli and Sam face heavy artillery and Sam is reminded of what Caeli was raised to be...

Caeli still sat in the tower, Sam on and off of the phone with his brother to help solve the puzzle that Nate and Sully were trying to solve. He was currently back on the phone when Caeli's instinct kicked in again, much stronger than before.

There were people outside. Shoreliners. She knew it.

She stood up immediately, turning towards the door, Sam noticed the movement and paused his conversation with Nate.

“What's wrong?” He asked, Caeli looked towards him.

“They're here.” She answered, pulling out her gun.

“How did they know where to find us?” Sam questioned, Caeli thought on the question for a moment before she realised exactly how, she used the same technique to find her own targets when given a job. She took the phone from Sam's hand.

“Hey Nate, you might want to destroy the phone your using.” Caeli stated bluntly.

_“Why?”_

“They know where we are, Nate. They hacked our phones. Sam and I will meet you, if you come for us I will kill you with my bare hands. Understood?” She asked.

 _“Alright, see you soon then.”_ Nate hung up and she hoped he was destroying it. Caeli went to drop and step on Sam's phone when it started ringing again, an unknown number was on the screen. She looked up to Sam, a gut feeling telling her to answer.

“Hello?” She asked, waiting for a response.

_“Caeli-”_

“What do you want, Rafe?” She cut him off, ignoring Sam's look of desperation.

 _“So you figured out we hacked the phones, it's a little too late though. We already have the pictures, so we'll probably reach the next clue before you do. I would give up now, it would be easiest, safest, for  you.”_ Rafe stated

“You mean safest for you.” She corrected him pacing around the room, gun still in her prominent hand. The feeling of danger was becoming stronger with each passing minute.

_“I have an army, Caeli-”_

“You can't hide behind them forever. I was raised as an assassin, taking your army of amateur mercenaries down one by one is going to be fairly easy for me. I've done it before, with people much more skilled than yours. The Order is no joke, and I managed to take them down with a little help. There's four of us, at the moment, and with the Order there was only three.” She said, a smile on her face.

 _“Give up now Caeli, and you get to live.”_ Rafe stated.

“You give up, Rafe, because you're the one I'm going to kill if you don't. If you honestly think you stand a chance against me, you're wrong. Killing you will be like child's play. I think that it's you who needs to contemplate giving up, and you best do it soon.” Caeli stated, hanging up and throwing the phone to the ground with such force it shattered. She didn’t see Sam’s reaction to her words, but that wasn’t any of her concern in that moment of time.

The instinctive feeling of danger hit her even harder…

Bomb.

She ran to Sam, grabbing his shoulders.

_Please, accept us both._

She melted to the shadows, and by some miracle, she was able to take Sam with her as a bomb hit the tower and set off an explosion large enough to crumble one of the walls. She shadow-walked to them outside of the building, exhaustion taking over her from taking Sam with her as well.

Once she thought they were a safe distance she brought them back to the real world, panting with a gun in one hand and Sam's shoulder still in the other. He had a shocked look on his face, confused and dazed as he looked to Caeli.

“Did you just…” He trailed off as she nodded, still breathing like she had just ran a marathon. “Are you okay?”

“I haven't done that before…” She whispered, letting go of Sam's shoulder and tilting her head back as if it might help her suck in more oxygen.

“How'd you know it would work?” Sam asked next, she turned to look at him.

“I didn't.” She answered, realising that her gut feeling had yet to leave. “I had hope.” She added, taking the safety off of her pistol and looking around.

“We're still not safe?” Sam asked next, she smirked at him.

“When are we ever?” She had a point, and they both knew that. "We need to start moving." She stated simply, and so they did. Going into these kinds of situations was usually led by the Drakes, but getting back out of them… that was Caeli's specialty. She had saved them from sure capture many times before, Sam knew that she would do so again.

"Wait." She instructed, her hand out in front of Sam as they paused in the marketplace. There was the distant echo of heavy gunfire, and he hoped his brother was okay. Her focus wasn't on those gunshots, but instead was on the road ahead of them where a military vehicle was driving towards them. Actually, the fleet of military vehicles.

"Sam, run. Find something mobile we can steal." She stated simply, raising her gun towards the vehicles. He didn't move  confused as to why she was going to take on five, minimum, vehicles with a handgun. She turned to look at him, a predatory look in her eyes that he had seen only at times of high danger like this. "Go." She stated, shooting her first shot and hitting one of the vehicles in it's tyre, making it lose control and crash into another one of the vehicles. Both blew up in flames. "I'll catch up, just give me a minute." She added, looking him in the eyes.

"Promise?" He asked her, needing that childish security.

"I promise." She responded, her hard eyes softened for just a moment before looking back to the vehicles and reassessing the situation. "Go and get us a vehicle, Sam." She repeated, and he ran towards where a group of motorbikes were abandoned once people had run after the explosion. He took one, figuring it would be best for him to drive and for Caeli to shoot. It was easy to start, since the keys had been left in the ignition, and he took it back to where Caeli had been.

The five vehicles were on the road, each in their own way of destruction, but Caeli was nowhere to be found, until he heard gunshots. He took the bike towards the sound and saw her brown hair on top of a building, he pulled up and watched as her head shot in his direction.

She began running towards him. Although, _running_ was a loose term. She sprinted before she would turn into a shadow, intermittently appearing and disappearing to throw off Shoreline. They hadn't seen him yet, and he took the opportunity to steal one of their semi-auto guns from an unsuspecting mercenary who happened to walk in his direction.

Once Caeli eventually made it to him he handed her the gun and she sat on the back of the bike.

"A bike? What kind of protection do we have on a bike?" She asked as he began to take off through the streets of the city.

"None, but we have agility." Sam replied, trying not to look behind him as Caeli turned around to face behind them. "Plus you have free shooting range." Her response was to use that free shooting range, the gun she was using being put to good use and taking down anyone she could see. It wasn't too soon after she began shooting that she stopped.

"I'm out of ammo, I'll shadow to one of the cars, they seem to have plenty of ammo to go around." She told him, before the weighting of the bike felt different. She was gone, and he was out in the open without a gun or protection.

"Shit, shit, shit…" he continued chanting that same word over and over again as he dodged other mercenaries on bikes, vehicles trying to knock him over and any bullets that were heading his way. Soon, the weight of the bike changed again and the sound of a gun was coming from directly behind him again, an immediate feeling of relief washing over his body as each biker around him fell off their bike dead or the engine below them exploded.

"If I run out, there's a big problem." Caeli stated, and Sam spared a look behind him to see a bag hanging off of Caeli's body, filled to the brim with ammo for the semi-auto she was using efficiently. A car exploded behind them, so he turned to face where he was going. "I think I saw Rafe on a vehicle, driving away from this fight. He had Nadine and a kid with him." Caeli told Sam, he thought back to the two years he had spent with Rafe and how that kid seemed to be the most important thing to him. But Caeli didn't know that, she thought that Alcazar had broken him out.

"A kid?" He asked, sounding shocked. It was much easier to lie to someone when you weren't looking at them.

"Yeah… it was strange." She told him, another vehicle exploded. He was starting to remember just how deadly she was, that she knew how to destroy anything with a scary amount of efficiency and take down anyone in a matter of seconds. "Why would Rafe have a kid with him?" She asked, it was rhetorical, as she assumed Sam didn't know the answer.

"I don't know." He replied, just to be safe.

"It doesn't make sense…" She then trailed off, another car exploding behind them. "Oh shit…"

"What?" He asked her, feeling as she shifted to face where they were going.

"Go faster." She said simply.

"I can't really go any faster, Caels." He responded.

"You have to, Sam." She told him, her voice sounding concerned. If she was concerned there was something very wrong.

"Why?"

"Because there's basically a massive military vehicle coming after us, and you really have to understand that I am sort of underestimating the size when I say _massive._ " Caeli responded, Sam looked over his shoulder and saw the gigantic, black vehicle coming towards them. He increased the revs and picked up some more speed, but he wasn't sure if the bike could go any faster than what it was.

"Can't you shoot it down?" He asked her.

"I've seen this type of vehicle before, they are very hard to destroy, especially with something as pitiful as a semi-automatic. We have to outrun it before it starts shooting at us." She told him, but he shook his head.

"This is as fast as we're going to go." He told her, she sighed.

"I really have to do everything myself, don't I?" It seemed that she was asking the question rhetorically, so he didn't respond. "I'll see if shooting at it continuously will do any damage. No matter what you do, don't slow down." She told him, beginning to shoot at the vehicle. She shot out the wheels, but it kept going, so her next aim was the engine. The weakest spot would be the grill, and that was where her focus would need to be.

Round after round was shot into the vehicle, and it only made the engine begin smoking.

"Uh, Caeli?"

"What?" She snapped, continuing to shoot.

"Do you think you could shadow us again?" He asked her.

"I don't know, why?"

"Well, we've got another vehicle heading right for us." Sam answered, Caeli turned to look at where they were going and indeed saw another vehicle exceptionally similar to the one still going behind them.

"Fuck." She swore, but he knew that she was already assessing the situation and finding different ways to get out of it with their lives. "I can try, but we need to hit that bridge in case I can't. The river is strong, but we should be able to get out of it as a backup plan." She told him, so he revved the engine again and picked up even more speed, driving towards the second truck and hitting the bridge. He then turned towards the edge of it as Caeli grabbed his shoulder, luckily the shadows accepted them both once more.

They watched as the two trucks screeched to a halt in front of each other, watched as mercenaries tried looking for them, but Caeli was exhausted and had to get them back to normal at a safe distance. She managed to rush them back to the marketplace before she couldn't hold their shadow forms any longer. Sam managed to hijack another motorbike and they rode back to the hotel.

Caeli didn't care for a debrief of the day, she would find out everything important tomorrow.

For now, the shower was calling to her.


	10. Confessions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which secrets held between Caeli and Sam are finally spoken out loud...

Caeli turned the shower taps off, grabbing her towel and wrapping it around her body before she stood still, studying her arms. The scars the Order gave her stood out prominently against her pink skin still warm from the shower. Everything that had happened to her, it was never going to leave and the mental scars were the worst of them all. Because of them she wasn't sure if she would ever be able to feel the same again, to show emotions as she used to, to let people as close to her as she once had.

The mental manipulation was what had destroyed her completely, sending her into an almost catatonic state after…

She couldn't even speak of it, think of it, yet she knew it would have to come into the open eventually.

The only thing that snapped her back to her senses was getting her power, her shadow-walking. It was a chance to escape, if she played it right, which she thankfully did.

She walked up to the mirror, and for the first time since she had gotten away from the order she wiped the condensation from the reflective glass and took in her own appearance. She had, of course, looked in mirrors when applying makeup and the like, but never had she done so to just see herself as she is, to get a sense of self-identity back.

Her hair had been blonded when she first met Sam until she grew tired of the damage it did to her dark brown hair, and it had finally grown to meet where the towel sat against her body. The Order had shaved her hair off, to make access to her brain easier when they wanted to do so, it had been that way for the eleven years she had been trapped with them for. When she got out she had promised herself that she would only grow it out once the Order was taken down, hence when she had been reunited with Nate her hair had been cropped short.

Her ears still had some holes from her piercings, they never seemed to want to heal, so she would always remember those reckless days.

She touched the scars on her arms and the ones that just reached above the towel on her torso, she had been violated many times over, cut into everywhere but her face. She had survived them and she had done so with her sanity intact. She was almost grateful for her time with them, her strength and speed wouldn't be anywhere near as great as they are now if they hadn't of experimented on her and she would never have gotten her shadow-walking. Aside from that she now had her family back, they may have been more distant and more of a wreck than fifteen years ago but they were together and they were all alive by some miracle. She had lost years of her life to the Order but with time, and a very patient therapist, she had been able to find a way to accept what had happened to her, although she probably wouldn't admit to Nathan that after they took the Order down a reason she had disappeared was to go through intense therapy. She had ways to cope with everything now, and she was in a much better place than she used to be.

The door to the room that she and Sam were sharing clicked open, meaning that the debrief with Sully and Nate had ended, soon after the bathroom door swung open. Clearly she had forgotten to lock it, but she didn't particularly care. In fact, Sam seemed to mind the situation more than she did.

“Oh Jesus Christ, I'm sorry, I didn't-”

“It's fine.” She told him, finally turning away from her reflection to look him in the eyes. But he wasn't looking at her face, he was looking at her legs, her arms, seeing the scars that covered her body for the first time.

“What the hell did they do to you?!” He exclaimed, all care about walking in on her in just a towel seemingly dissipated as he walked over to her, gingerly touching her arm and tracing over the scars with concern.

“The Order tortured me to make me docile.” She answered, very aware of the fact that she wasn't pulling away from his touch.

“You were there for eleven years while I-”

“Don't blame yourself for this, it's not your fault.” She stated, believing her every word although he seemed to think otherwise.

“This wasn't the worst, was it? Physical pain was something you never cried from, even that time when you broke your arm.” It was true, the only time she had cried in front of Sam was when she had ended their relationship all those years ago.

“The mental manipulation shattered me, your supposed death had a good part to play in that. Three times a day they would repeat the same words to me; ‘Sam died because you weren't there, the doctors were not skilled enough to save him from the three bullet wounds to the stomach.’ So I eventually began to blame myself for it, then I was manipulated into a relationship with Talbot, I hadn't known he was second in command until a month into the relationship where Marlowe told me that I couldn't trust anyone. Not even him. That betrayal… it shook me.”

“There’s something else, that happened, wasn't there?” She nodded in response to his question. “You can't speak about it?” She shook her head. “You probably have PTSD, I mean you shouldn't have to cover your scars because they-”

“You're a bit late with the ‘coming to terms’ part of the recovery pathway, I'm fine with my scars, I just don't want any other people reacting to them like you have been.” She told him, pulling her arm away from his lingering touch, no matter how much it pained her to do so. “What's really going on here? Why are you back so early?”

“Elena… she found us.” Sam told her, prompting a roll of eyes from the assassin.

“Didn't end well, I take it?” He nodded in response. “Well, it's probably similar to what we went through.” She stated, turning to get her clothes and begin dressing.

“What do you mean by that?”

“You were in prison for fifteen years and couldn't figure out why I broke it off with you?” She asked him, slightly shocked but not really surprised.

“I think ‘broke it off’ is putting it a little lightly.” Sam stated, receiving a pointed look in reply. She began clothing herself, he had seen her body many times before, so it didn't bother her, especially since he had averted his eyes to the mouldy ceiling.

“ _Samuel, this ridiculous hunt for treasure, it's not worth losing your life over, you are going to get yourself killed_.” She stated simply, turning towards him once she had fully dressed herself. “Those words, you surely remember them.” The solemn look on his face was enough of a reply for her. Those words, that sentence, triggered the argument that lead to their relationships demise, where they shouted at each other for an hour, Sam defending his plan and Caeli wanting to retire and have a normal life. All she had wanted was to prevent any more danger from threatening their lives, to settle down and buy a house, raise a small family… not that he felt the same and at that point it had been exceptionally important to Caeli. “That wasn't the first time I said something like that to you, three times I asked for you to stop and just _live_ with me, each time you lied and said it would be the final hunt. I had hoped that if I broke up with you it would shock you into realising what you should be doing, clearly that didn't work since we're in this mess again.”

“We are in this mess because of Alca-”

“Alcazar is dead.” She cut him off, and he was shocked into a submissive silence. “He has been for months, and you're lucky neither of the other two know that. I've kept that secret for you because I knew there would be a reason behind you lying. When you first told me the story I knew it was bullshit, when we first got here, when I sat in this bathroom with the water running for ages I looked Alcazar up and found out he was dead.” She walked out of the bathroom then, finding the walls to be suffocating, Sam followed her out as he struggled over what to say next.

“It… two years ago Rafe found out I was still alive, broke me out and forced me to search for Avery's treasure with him.” Sam told her, and Caeli immediately froze. The shadows in the room began to darken and grow, she couldn't even turn to look at him she was so angry.

“So all of this bullshit is to fuel your fucking ego, not save your life.” She almost growled the words.

“Caeli-”

“Don’t. You probably just ruined Nate and Elena's marriage because of your idiocy. I hope you feel absolutely great about that.” She told him, forcing herself to calm down.

“Why are you here Caeli? You've been against this whole thing from the start so what are you even doing here? Why are you helping us?” Sam turned the argument back on her and she could barely believe it. She finally turned to look at him, hoping he could see the raw emotion in her eyes. The worry, the concern, the fear.

“Because, Samuel, last time you didn't have me, you almost died.” She replied gravely and calmly, her anger still present but ebbing away. “You two are my family, we have always been a family. Nate is the brother I never had and you were the love of my life. My parents, they weren't who I thought they were. Conceiving me was an order they had to fulfill so the Order could have a child to experiment on, they brought me to America and left me as a part of the Order's plan, but they didn't think I would evade recapture as well as I did. So, with my lack of a family I made one with you two and Sully, _my_ three idiots that I will do anything for if it meant keeping you safe.” She explained, sitting down on the mattress. “That is why I'm here, Sam, because even after all these years apart… you can never turn your back on family.” Sam then sat next to her on the bed, looking at his hands, giving her a minute before speaking again.

“I know you don't want to hear this right now, but I think you should know…” Sam trailed off, hesitating immediately.

“What?”

“Rafe has something, more like someone, he can use against you.” Sam stated, Caeli raised an eyebrow.

“Not possible all I have are you guys-”

“It's a kid., the kid you saw today” Sam cut her off, and she immediately began feeling sick. _No, no, it can't be, there's no way…_

“What kid?”

“A boy, about fourteen I think.” Sam responded, Caeli fought back the urge to throw up.

“What's his name?”

“Why is the kid important?”

“Tell me what his fucking name is.” Caeli looked to Sam with an expression that he had barely seen in their time together. Desperation.

“Cassius.” Caeli's body shuddered at the name, tears immediately coming forward in her eyes.

“Shit…” She trailed off, running a shaky hand through her hair.

“Caels, what does the kid have to do with anything?”

“Are you an absolute moron, do you have any kind of brain in that skull of yours?” She asked him, not wanting to say it out loud. She had never spoken of it, not even to her therapist. She physically was unable to get the words out of her mouth. But, Sam stayed quiet, from the look on his face he had an idea but didn't want to say it out loud. “I don't know how he did it, but Rafe… if that kid's name is Cassius, and he's fourteen…” Her hands were clenched into fists so tight that she could feel her nails slicing through skin.

“Caeli, is that our…” Sam trailed off, as if he had already thought about it but didn't want to admit to it.

“Our child, yes.” She finally put it in the open, but it wasn't as liberating as she might hope. She was finding it hard to breathe, to get air into her lungs. “Cassius was the thing that truly shattered my resolve at the Order, when they found out I was pregnant they were going to force me to have an abortion but then they found out you had died and thought they could screw with me by making me go through with the pregnancy. They did everything in their power to make sure that the baby would be as healthy as possible, regular checkups, making me eat a balanced diet, pregnancy vitamins… when Cassius finally came they let me have him for eight days. When I woke up on the ninth he was gone. They had taken him and anything that could remind me of him, the bassinet, the blankets, everything… I thought they might have killed him but I hoped they would take him to an orphanage, so I put a small piece of paper in his nappy every night with his name on it, just in case they took him, and I'm glad I did.” She stated.

“We have a son…” Sam trailed off, like he could barely believe it. “I've met him, and I didn't even know…” He added.

“Samuel.” Caeli snapped him from his thoughts, she had no doubt they were going darker with every passing moment. “There was no way for you to know.”

“But, I could have figured it out. I overheard Rafe saying that the kid was something he could use against you, I didn't hear the rest aside from his name, now that I think on it he was probably saying the kid could be used against me too if necessary.” He stated.

“You couldn't have known, not for sure.” She tried to comfort him but failed, her breathing only just calming herself.

“Rafe takes the kid everywhere with him, keeps him at a safe distance. I don't know how long he's had the… _Cassius_ , for, but he probably trusts Rafe more than anyone now.” Sam stated, not noticing as silent tears began running down Caeli's cheeks. She had hoped that with her son being left out of her life he would be safe, that being put in an orphanage was best. How she was wrong… “How did Rafe know we had a kid?”

“I told Rafe I was pregnant after we broke up, he wanted to be with me but I turned him down. He asked why, and I gave him a list of reasons, I still loved you and I was carrying your child were two of many. He said it didn't matter, that he would raise your kid as his own… I guess I didn't understand how serious he was about that until now.” She closed her eyes, not wanting to open them again. Never in her wildest dreams had she thought she would find Cassius again, and now… she was hoping she never had.

“That was the final reason as to why we ended, wasn't it?” Sam asked next.

“I wanted a family, we had the opportunity to have one and you didn't want to take it. I was so angry I didn't want to tell you because I thought you didn't deserve to know. I should have, I should have told you…” She trailed off.

“No, you shouldn't have. I was dickhead, I should have left it all behind but I couldn't. This is what my mother was searching for, it was more important than anything else, no matter how much I wanted to leave and be with you.” He replied, helping her feel more at ease about that decision at least. They sat in silence for a few more moments before Sam spoke again. “So, Cassius is named after…”

“Your mother, Cassandra Morgan. I gave him the Morgan name as well, decided it was safer than Drake.” She answered.

“Cassius Morgan.” Sam stated.

“Cassius Samuel Morgan, actually. He probably doesn't know the middle name it wasn't on the note.” She corrected Sam.

“Why would you give him my name? I'm a fucking shit role model-”

“I thought you were dead at the time, don't flatter yourself.” She replied, a small amount of humour coming from the sentence, enough to make her smile the smallest amount.

“That's true, I guess my charm always wins in the end.” Caeli nudged his side with her shoulder at his statement.

“Sure it does, Casanova.” She rolled her eyes with the sarcastic statement.

“It won you over, didn't it?” Sam asked, her smile grey.

“I felt sorry for your lack of a brain, I fell in love with you through pity.” She told him, feeling as he then held her hand within his own, a soft smile on his face.

“Whatever works.” He replied, looking up from their now joined hands to look her in the eyes. “I'm sorry.” He said, completely genuine in his apology, she didn't know how to respond verbally so instead just squeezed his hand. “You probably don't want to hear this right now, but…”

“If it's going to be another bombshell like Cassius can it wait until tomorrow?” She asked, trying to joke but failing at the mention of her son… _their son._ Sam shook his head gently.

“No, it shouldn't be a shock but… I still care for you.” He stated, she breathed a sigh of relief.

“I still care for you as well.” She replied, still holding eye contact with each other. Sam used his free hand to hold the back of her neck, leaning in to place a gentle kiss against her lips. She returned the gesture before they both pulled away, that was enough for them at that point in time. With their foreheads resting against each other Caeli closed her eyes, relaxing for the first time in what felt like forever.

“We'll get our son back from Rafe, and then we'll get a nice house and leave all this illegal shit behind.” Sam stated quietly.

“After, or at the same time as, we find Avery's treasure.” Caeli added just above a whisper, Sam mumbled his agreement before they kissed once more. Sam then stood up, going to have a shower since he was still covered in mud from the day's adventures, Caeli had laid down on the bed, and before the water was even turned on, she was out like a light.


	11. Realisations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Caeli realises she may not hate the whole treasure-hunting idea as she might have let on...

Sam was tempted to let Caeli sleep until she woke herself, she had wrapped the covered up to her chin, apparently sensitive to the cool air in the room. She looked peaceful when she slept, there was no sign of the pain she had gone through and no one would even guess that she was a highly trained killer who had taken down the people who had destroyed her life. You wouldn’t think that her entire body was covered with scars from torture designed to make her docile.

You wouldn’t think that she had lost her son because of those same people.

A son. That kid, Rafe’s kid, was his kid. And he hadn’t even noticed. Now he reflected back on it, he always felt that the kid’s grey eyes reminded him of Caeli. His facial structure was so similar to Sam’s when he had been that age… how had he not noticed?

He was a bit focused on finding out if Caeli was alive, he guessed.

Cassius was always there, reminding him of Caeli and not knowing why until now.

He was a father...

That should be what he was focusing on right now, but he couldn’t. The scars that covered Caeli’s body were continuously running through his mind. She had worn flesh coloured tights at the auction to hide them, the sleeves on the romper were for the same reason. She always wore long sleeved shirts or jumpers, full length pants... because of the Order. Because he had left her alone after that argument. He should have said he would leave with her, but his stupid ego got in the way.

He brushed some of Caeli’s hair off of her face, realising that he never wanted to leave her side again. If he lost her now... he didn’t know what he would do.

Especially if he lost her to Rafe.

Rafe was the reason he was out of jail, but he was also the reason that he had been in there in the first place. He could’ve let the guard in on the money, he and Nate honestly didn’t mind that much if it meant they all got to live. Rafe, the selfish dick, couldn’t live with losing a bit of money.

Well, technically it wasn’t even losing because that quarter had been Caeli’s until she left.

_Kidnapped_. Until she was kidnapped.

There were so many thing he had to recorrect in his memory, Caeli had been kidnapped, the kid Rafe took with him everywhere was his and Caeli’s son, Nate was married and everyone thought he was dead for fifteen years. He didn’t blame them, he could barely believe that he had survived himself. But there was always that dread, that feeling that he had been left behind.

That was why the first thing he did when Rafe broke him out was to see if Caeli was alive. He didn’t want her to feel that way...

When he found out that she was, he was almost devastated. That meant she hadn’t come looking for him, to check that he was dead. To make sure there wasn’t a chance he was alive. That was why he wouldn’t tell her about what he did when he first got out, the part of the agreement that Rafe had to fulfil before Sam would even start looking for clues for Avery’s treasure.

Sam wanted to see Caeli with his own eyes.

So Rafe took him to America, where he saw Caeli with Nate and Elena, out getting coffee. Something had hit him hard in the chest when he saw Caeli smile that day, that she was happy without him. Rafe had told him to go over once Nate and Elena left, leaving Caeli alone, but something stopped him when he watched Caeli’s smile leave her face and she stared at her hands. She then pulled out a necklace from the inside of her shirt, a ring hanging from the chain.

He couldn’t go over to her, he knew that ring was the one he had given her and he suddenly felt guilty for blaming her for not coming to find him. She genuinely thought that he was dead...

And so he walked away, vowing that if they ever came to meet again he would lie and pretend that he thought she was dead. He didn’t want her to think he was waiting all those years for her to save him, even though that’s what he had been doing. She didn’t know and that’s how it would stay.

Caeli’s eyes scrunched in her sleep, her breathing quickening as she began mumbling words he couldn’t understand. She had always talked in her sleep, to the point where he had eventually become used to it. That was one of the hardest things after they were separated, was learning how to sleep without someone next to him again. Without Caeli next to him. The strange and lonely silence of not having her there meant he didn’t sleep for days, when he was able to sleep waking up without her there was always a stark reminder of what had happened.

She slowly opened her eyes, squinting as her eyes adjusted to the light in the room. Sam had been up for half an hour already, getting everything ready for the day ahead. She sighed as she stretched, pulling the sheets up to her chin again to keep warm.

“What’s the time?” She asked, her voice croaky with sleep.

“Nearly seven.” He answered, she immediately sat up a worried look on her face.

“We were supposed to leave at half-past-six.” She stated.

“I didn’t want to wake you…” Sam replied, taking in her features. “Plus Nate hasn’t come knocking on the door yet, so I would say he isn’t ready either.” He added, Caeli threw the sheets off of herself and standing up.

“Yeah well, he’s probably depressed about what happened last night with Elena.” Caeli responded, grabbing clean clothes out of her bag and going to the bathroom to change. He grabbed the last things he would need for the day’s adventures, and got the money for the boat hire ready before she came out again.

She wore a long sleeved shirt, the sleeves rolled up, a pair of jeans and her boots. She readied herself quickly, tucking a knife into her boot and holstering her gun before putting a jacket on.

“Rope?” He checked with her, she sighed before grabbing the rope and grappling hook, attaching it to her belt.

“Let’s go.” She told him, tying her hair up before walking towards the door. Her attitude seemed different today, she didn’t seem to be as adverted to the idea of finding this treasure as she had yesterday. If anything, he would say she looked excited about the day ahead. Maybe she was looking forward to getting Cassius back…

Or maybe she had remembered that this was a part of who she was.

***

“I don’t understand how I'm still the only one with a boat licence.” Caeli whispered to herself as they neared their island destination. The markings that Nate and Sully had found at the tower overlapped to make the map of an island, the one they were heading to right now. Nate was by himself at the back of the boat, watching the water as he seemed to be deep in thought, Sam was a meter or two away from her, seeming to be doing the same thing.

Her statement didn’t reach either of them, as hoped.

“Land ho!” She shouted, shaking them both from their thoughts and getting their attention. Sam and Nate both made their way to the front of the boat, looking through the glass and seeing the island in the distance. Sam had a look of wonder on his face as he saw the island’s silhouette against the clouded sky.

“What do you think about that?” Sam asked Nate, who still lacked any kind of joy that Caeli was used to seeing on his face.

“It’s pretty cool.” Nate replied, half-heartedly.

“Take the wheel.” Caeli instructed to the younger brother, who did as he was told as she sat down on the edge of the boat. She knew that if he had a job to do then he could focus on that instead of replaying the night before in his mind. She understood the situation a little too well to not sympathise with him. From Sam’s expression he seemed to do the same, even as he walked to the back of the boat to the esky and took out three bottles of beer, one for each of them.

“You know, all this running around, surviving by the skin of our teeth, I don’t think we’ve actually taken a moment to step back and appreciate…” He paused as he took the caps off of the bottles, he was about the throw the trash into the water until he received a pointed look from Caeli, he dropped them on the boat floor instead. “…just how far we’ve come.” He finished, looking at her before handing a bottle to Nate and one to her. She guessed they had come a long way, geographically speaking and emotionally.

Sam was alive, Rafe had her son…

She had never imagined that any of this would be happening, and as they sailed towards the next step to the treasure she realised something else. She may have hated the idea of risking their lives for treasure when they started this idiotic search, but as each day passed she was realising how much she missed working with the brothers and hunting for treasure. Even if there was usually no reward.

She took a sip of her beer, looking up at Sam. They had kissed the night before, and yet that wasn’t prominent to her. It was just as if they had picked up where they left off… well, before the argument, she guessed. She had missed him, and only now was she actually accepting that all of this was real. That he was real.

“Sic parvis magna.” Sam stated, watching Nate carefully.

“Sic parvis magna.” Nate repeated the words, tapping his bottle against Sam’s and they both took a drink. With a slight look from Sam, Caeli moved to the back of the boat, aware that whatever conversation was going to continue should be private. But Sam should know that she would be listening in anyway.

“Listen, little brother, she will get over it.” Caeli rolled her eyes at Sam’s choice of words, and from Nate’s sigh she could tell he felt the same. “I mean, we bring back a treasure like that, anyone would.”

“Oh my fucking god.” Caeli whispered to herself, shaking her head as she watched the horizon behind them. Sam still had no idea on what Elena was like. He still had no idea on women, to be honest.

“I don’t know.” Nate replied, and Caeli wasn’t entirely sure either. Elena was similar to her in many ways, she cared about the people more than the money. She completely understood where Elena was coming from, but she didn’t know if this would be the last straw that she could handle. Caeli didn’t know if Elena would forgive Nate for this, for lying so heavily and for so long. “I think maybe I’ve, uh, done this one too many times.”

They eventually made it to the island, mostly in silence from there on out. They stopped once they were close, deciding where they should go first.

“Huh, somehow I imagined it bigger.” Sam stated, Caeli had to physically restrain herself from rolling her eyes once again.

“Yeah, well we’re definitely in the right place, I’ll find us a spot to set ashore” Nate replied, completely focused on the task at hand.

“He’s not okay, is he?” Sam whispered as he walked to the back of the boat to sit next to Caeli on the edge.

“Well, your pep talk was pretty shit so I'm not surprised.” She responded.

“What was wrong with it?”

“What if Nate said all of that to you, about me. That I would get over it because you found a great amount of treasure. How would you react?” She asked him, he seemed to understand then.

“She doesn’t care about the money, she cares about him more.” He responded, Caeli nodded.

“So you see, Samuel, that was a very wrong assumption. Had I known you were going to go down that path with your damn secret conversation I wouldn’t have walked away.” She responded, shaking her head. “You don’t know Elena, at all. So don’t make superficial assumptions about her. They met after he contacted her about finding Sir Francis Drake’s coffin, she hosted a TV show called ‘Uncharted’ and he needed money to be able to find the coffin. They then found El Dorado together, faced monstrous things together, they broke up, then came Shambala… they got married, then Elena left him because he was… too focused on treasure. Then Iram of the Pillars came around, Elena helped Sully and Nate and I. After that, Nate realised how much danger he was putting himself in and decided to retire and live a normal life with Elena which was going perfectly fine until you turned up alive. They’ve been through a lot together, Sam, understand that and you will understand why Nate is devastated and doesn’t know if she’s going to come back to him.”

Caeli pushed up from her sitting position, walking towards the front of the boat to stand next to Nate as he kept looking for a place to land.

“Well, at least there’s an island.” Sam stated, looking around.

“At least there’s an island.” Nate agreed. “Just keep an eye out for anything man-made.”

“Ah-ah, you mean pirate-made.” Sam corrected, once again, Caeli had to stop herself from rolling her eyes. “So, maybe Libertalia is more of a beach-side shack…”

“Libertalia?” Caeli asked, almost in disbelief. “Was this something that you were supposed to catch me up but didn’t?” She asked, watching Sam carefully.

“Yeah… that would be it.” He responded.

“For the love of god.” She breathed, shaking her head.

“From all of the portraits at the tower I think that what we’re looking for is actually Libertalia.” Nate explained, Caeli sighed.

“I thought it might be, from that poem in Scotland.” Caeli responded, taking out her notebook from the inside pocket of her jacket and scribbling down the note of what Nate had just told her. This was what she enjoyed doing, recording all of the information so she could remember it later. So she could show people… could show Cassius.

“You could have said something.” Nate responded, and Caeli shook her head.

“I was working on the assumption that _paradise_ meant _Libertalia_. You guys would have thrashed me with such little evidence.” She responded, closing the book and putting it back in it’s safe place.

“Look, I'm not going to say you’re wrong but-”

“Wait.” Caeli cut Sam off, pointing towards one of the small beaches. “There.” A watchtower was on one of the islands that belonged to this place, so Nate stopped the boat and they all jumped not the sand to go towards it.

“Looks like an old lookout tower.” Sam stated once they made it to the base of the olden building.

“You going to climb?” Caeli asked Nate, who was already going into the tower to get to the top and have a look at their surroundings. “Take that as a ‘yes’ then.” Caeli added, watching with concern as Nate disappeared into the watchtower from her position outside of it. Sam then walked into the tower and began climbing. “So we’re all going in then.” She whispered to herself, beginning to climb after Sam was at a reasonable distance from her.

Once they climbed to the top of the tower they found a symbol on the wall. An arrow.

“That looks promising.” Sam said once they were all on their feet in the room at the top of the tower.

“Huh, looks like some kind of symbol.” Nate stated the obvious, as per usual.

“Looks like a compass arrow.” Caeli said, touching the gold-leafing on the symbol gently before pushing against it. Doing so set some kind of machinery into action, the wall before them opening to become a window.

“Woah, how did you know to do that?” Nate asked, Caeli shrugged her shoulders.

“If I’ve learnt anything from being around you two, it’s that I need to press everything to get anywhere.” She answered, resting her hands on the windowsill and looking out. Nate chuckled, and it was the first sign of positive emotion since they left that morning.

“Down there, it’s the same symbol.” Sam pointed to the beach they landed on and saw a stone block with the arrow on top.

“It’s another arrow.” Nate responded, Caeli pushed away from the window.

“Then let’s go and follow it.”


	12. At Sea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we see the true extent and origin of Caeli's powers...

Following the arrows was the easy part, Caeli took control of the boat on the way. Once they came to the end of the arrows they were inside of a large cave, there was no way to land the boat near ground as the water only met the walls of the natural room around them. There was one way to get out that had sunlight and grass, they assumed they had to go that way.

But the staircase that led up the side of the cave to that exit was destroyed halfway.

She began looking around the cave, seeing a possible way to get to the exit through rock-climbing.

“This way.” She said as she climbed on top of the boat’s roof and began climbing her way up the natural pillar in the middle of the cave, with a simple swing across the cave using her rope she was across safely and easily.

And without getting into the water.

“Why didn’t you shadow-walk?” Sam asked once he landed next to her.

“Why would I?” She replied.

“It’s easier…” he trailed off, she smiled at him.

“It is, but I need to keep my fitness up somehow. Besides, I can save using the shadows for emergencies. It’s a different kind of energy that can get exhausted when I use them too much.” She told him, they began following Nate who was already walking in the direction they needed to go.

“Wow. Avery wasn’t much for subtlety or understatement, was he?” Nate asked as they saw a door with large statues either side.

“I guess not.” Caeli replied, looking at the craftsmanship before seeing that the doors were collapsed and impenetrable.

“Well, he had the money. If you’ve got it, flaunt it, right?” Sam added in, Caeli began rock-climbing again to get to a tunnel which would get them through to the other side. Hopefully. The brothers followed her, she always had a keen sense of direction and had never led them astray before.

The tunnel worked until a piece of a wooden infrastructure blocked their path.

She didn’t bother waiting for the brothers to help her lift it, instead she just shadowed through to the other side.

“I thought you were saving the use of the shadows!” She heard Sam shout from the other side, she smirked.

“You’re just jealous because I don’t have to lift that thing to get through!” She shouted back, looking around to find their next path. They were outside again now, which meant she was in full sunlight. She grimaced at the amount of light, but continued looking for where to go next nonetheless.

Once the brothers were through she began rock climbing once again, feeling like she was in her element while doing so. She continued leading the way until they found some infrastructure, archways and bridges.

“What do you think this place was?” Sam asked once they were all together.

“These arches remind me of the Saint Dismas Cathedral…” Nate trailed off, and Caeli could see where he was coming from. “But I, uh… don’t know.” There was some difficult continuing on, a rope bridge breaking under Sam’s weight and having to find a way to continue when Sam disappeared for a few minutes ‘to find something to help them get up’.

They eventually came across another watchtower, so they knew they were somewhat on the right track. It took climbing to the top of that tower to get high enough to get through the next section of wilderness and eventually to the other side of the door they had originally encountered.

They were inside of a room, it seemed like an important one due to the diorama of what appeared to be something city-like.

“You think they actually built all this stuff?” Sam asked once he was also in the room and saw the diorama.

“With these guys… I don’t know anymore.” Nate responded, Caeli looked away from the diorama towards an architectural sketch…

“Guys, look.” She drew their attention to it.

“Hey… uh maybe they were planning a massive theme park?” Sam joked, Caeli sighed.

“Out of all of the options you could have had, you went with ‘theme park’?” She questioned, he shrugged his shoulders.

“Not having a good day for this type of shit I guess.” He responded. Caeli then focused on the carved murals on the walls, they depicted the story of the founding of Libertalia.

“This is all well-made…” She whispered to herself, touching one of the stone carvings and feeling how smooth it was. After taking in all of the information they could they moved onto a different room, this one filled with supplies.

“I wonder if they went through with building Libertalia… I mean this was all in preparation for it, but why is it still here?” Sam questioned.

“They went through with it, they had to.” Caeli stated. “All of this planning, all of this dedication… you can’t commit your entire life to something and not follow through with it.” She added, the brother’s agreed with her.

“Yeah, well things don’t always go as planned.” Nate stated, the pessimist of the situation only because of his situation. They walked into another room, a symbol on the floor which Nate stood on to open a trap door. It lifted slightly…

“Ah crap, mechanism’s busted or something.” Nate stated.

“Oh no, we’re getting through there one way or another. Let’s just lift it together, all right?” Sam responded, looking to Caeli as she tucked her fingers under the door as well.

“Don’t look at me like that, sap of the Tree of Life, remember?” She stated. “I'm part Guardian of Shambala if we want to get technical.” She added.

“Oh god, this is heavy.” Nate stated as they began lifting it, Caeli didn’t really notice the weight of the door too much.

“Just think about all that treasure.” Sam said as Nate went through first.

“I'm kind of thinking about my back.” Nate replied as Caeli ducked through. Sam came through last and Nate and Caeli dropped the door.

“Shit.” She swore as she turned around to see the room they had walked into.

“Looks like we’ve got ourselves another trial.” Nate stated as they looked around the chamber. He reached the ship wheel in the middle of the room. Two bars of light entered the room and hit the wall, showing the shadow of a symbol. Nate moved the wheel and large orbs began moving around the walls. “Mechanical, patterned movements. All yours, Caels.” He added, she rolled her eyes as she walked up to the wheel and began working it out in her head.

As she completed each layer of the puzzle, new statues rose from the ground of each founding Pirate captain. It was safe to say that she completed the trial quicker than the brothers could have, but she was just as confused as to why there were only eleven statues when the trial was completed compared to the twelve founders that there should be. It was no surprise that Avery was the statue missing.

Another room opened, a staircase rising to meet the higher flooring of the second room. All that the room held was a lever, so Caeli walked to it and, without hesitation, she pulled it. There was a loud bang as the floor then began rising like an elevator. They were suddenly above ground again, with a perfect view of the first beach they had landed on and the missing Avery statue rising near where the watchtower was.

“Holy shit.” She said with a smile. If Caeli was honest she was very much beginning to enjoy how complicated this all was.

“You know, I'm starting the get the feeling that our friend was a bit of a narcissist.” Sam stated as they looked to the statue. The very large statue.

“You think?” Nate asked a little sarcastically, seeming to be slightly back to his normal self.

“Let’s go see what he has in store for us.” Caeli said as she began climbing to higher ground, the elevator kind of levelled up to a cliff and she wasn’t in the mood to die just yet.

“So, Nate, how does this stack up against your other adventures?” Sam asked, keeping conversation flowing. Nate thought about the question for a moment as they made their way back to their boat.

“Ask me again when we finish.” Nate replied, so Sam turned the question onto Caeli.

“How about you?” He asked, she thought back to escaping Iram of the Pillars, to killing Talbot.

“Well, ask me when we finish as well. I might still have to kill Rafe yet.” She replied, her bubbly mood gone. That day she had scared herself with what she was capable of, she found out that her powers were a little more dangerous and useful than shadows.

“Fair enough.” Sam responded, Caeli smiled weakly, her mind too preoccupied with Talbot’s screams to offer anything else.

***

_“Nate!” Sully shouted, Nate must have fallen off the side of this bloody shifting piece of towering land. She had destroyed places before, but never in such a way as Iram of the Pillars was being sucked into quicksand around her. Sections of land were separating and falling into the depths, Sully and Nate had been on one of those sections just ahead of her… at least until Nate fell off, or that’s what she guessed._

_When she landed on the same piece of floating, tower-like land she looked up and saw Talbot threatening Sully. Her breathing quickened, anger flaring through her body._

_“Talbot!” She shouted, and the man turned to face her. He didn’t look afraid of her, just as she had thought. He had seen her at her weakest, had helped to manipulate her into becoming a docile test subject._

_“What is it, pet?” He asked her, his attention now on her so Sully could help Nathan._

_“You ruined my life.” She stated simply, voices filling her ears. Voices that belonged to no one, but she knew were important. Her anger continued to grow, her body turning as cold as ice as it did. “You have to pay for what you did.” She spat through her teeth, and Talbot took two steps towards her. Back at the Order that was enough to shut her down, to stop her from acting out._

_Not this time._

_“Come on now, Caeli. You wouldn’t be half the person you are now without me.” Talbot responded, but his words didn’t work in the way she guessed he had hoped. She was unstable, she was dehydrated to the point where she had been seeing illusions, she was sunburnt and she was mentally scarred from her time in the Order._

_“You’re right.” She replied, looking to her hand as her veins began to turn black, she looked back up to him. This time there was fear in his eyes, she was guessing her eyes had turned pitch black, maybe even some of her skin was too. “Do you see what you have created?” She asked, taking a step towards him, her body shaking with anger and pain and adrenaline and something else she couldn’t name. Maybe it was energy?_

_The voices that surrounded her became louder, the whispers becoming shouts and screams as darkness surrounded her, swarmed around her with shadowed movement. She was beginning to think she didn’t control shadows after all._

_“Let’s see what happens when I'm not under your control.” She stated, the darkness stopping still around her before she threw her arms forward and they encased Talbot. He began screaming, but it wasn’t from pain, it was fear._

He is afraid of you. Of us.

_One voice rang clear to her in that moment, and that was when she knew for sure that the shadows she thought she controlled weren’t that at all. Spirits. She controlled spirits._

_She walked through the swarm of spirits, they moved around her, with her, as if she was one of them. They suddenly pulled away from Talbot and dissipated into the air. She gripped onto his throat, squeezing so hard he wasn’t able to breath properly._

_“You want to know something?” She asked him rhetorically, she could see herself in the reflection of his eyes and could now understand why he was afraid. Her eyes were, indeed, pitch black, the darkness spreading through her skin. She breathed slowly and the darkness slowly disappeared, after closing her eyes for a moment they turned back to grey and she looked him directly in the eyes. “You might have lived through this, but you made one mistake.”_

_She picked him up from the neck, he tried pulling at her fingers to get her to release but she didn’t. She was this way because he made her this way, he was the one in control of the experiments that were run on her. This superhuman strength, it was because of him. The shadows, the spirits, it was because of him._

_“You threatened my family.” She finished, throwing him off of the pillar of land and into the quicksand below. She looked over the edge, her breath shaking as much as her hands were._

_“We need to go.” Sully stated, she looked over her shoulder at them and nodded. Once they were at a safe distance she finally controlled her body to slow down, to breath properly and stop herself from shaking._

_“How much did you see?” Caeli asked Sully, riding her horse next to his. He turned to look at her with a concerned look on his face._

_“Only when you lifted him, anything before that is not my concern unless you want it to be.”_

_“So you did see it.” She replied, he didn’t correct her. “I don’t know what I am anymore, what I can do. I thought I controlled shadows but… I heard voices when I called on them this time. They were all so angry, not with me but with Talbot. They were spirits, ones who had been hurt by him Sully. They thought I was one of them. They accept me, what does that mean?”_

_“It means you need to work all of this out with someone with a little more professional experience than I do.” He responded._

_“In spirits?”_

_“In psychology, Caeli.”_

_“Fair point.”_


	13. The Storm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Caeli faces exhaustion after almost drowning, while having a theory on who the Spirit helping her may be...

Caeli stood at the base of the Avery statue, next to Sam. Nate was looking through the periscope that the statue was holding at its shoulder. Another island. More ocean to cross. A storm brewing on the horizon.

A painful feeling in the pit of her stomach.

“That must be it. Libertalia.” Sam said as Nate jumped down from the statue, after explaining there was a big island in the distance.

“That’s a bit optimistic, considering everything,” Nate replied, and Sam looked to Caeli for a brief second.

“You know, we are the only ones here. You are allowed to feel just a little bit of excitement about this.” Sam stated Caeli’s stomach started hurting more. There was a severe amount of danger coming their way.

“I’ll get excited when we get Alcazar’s noose off your neck,” Nate replied, and Caeli stared at Sam to see what his reaction was going to be. “C’mon,” Nate said after they stood in silence for a moment.

“Okay.”

“What?” Nate asked Sam, Caeli decided not to speak. It wasn’t her place.

“I said okay,” Sam replied.

“No, your ‘okay’s are never just ‘okay’s. It usually means the opposite of okay.” Nate argued and Caeli could feel the tension building.

“Guys…” She cut off the argument before it really began, hearing something. A boat engine. She looked to the ocean behind the brothers, seeing five boats on their way towards the island.

“Is that our boy Rafe?” Nate asked and Caeli began to hear whispers in her ears.

_The mercenaries. Run._

“Who the hell else?” Caeli asked, beginning to run back to the boat.

“Ah shit.” She heard Nate groan behind her before they started following her back to the boat.

They ran to the boat and began heading in the direction of the island. Caeli’s gut feeling continued getting worse, the storm picking up the closer they got to the island. They were a few kilometres offshore when Rafe’s men caught up to them, Nate drove the boat while Caeli and Sam shot people where they could, but Caeli’s hands were shaking.

“Are you alright?!” Sam asked her, seeing her pale face.

“I'm fine.” She lied, realisation seemed to click in his mind at that moment.

“We’re going to be fine, you will be fine.” He told her, holding her hand for a brief second before the mercenaries started shooting at them again.

“Head straight for the island!” Sam shouted to Nate before Caeli got a stabbing pain in her stomach. Something big was heading for them…

A large boat appeared over a wave and took out theirs, crushing the boat to pieces and throwing them into the stormy water. As soon as Caeli hit the water her panic began to set in, she struggled to get her head above water and when she could she couldn’t breathe properly.

“Sam!” She shouted once she was above water, hoping for a response. Her one fear had been of the ocean, and while she used to be able to handle it… ever since being waterboarded routinely at the Order, it had become somewhat harder to get herself to comfortably be in large bodies of water.

She didn’t receive a response from anyone, but her lungs were starting too hurt with the cold and the inability to breathe.

_Breathe._

A whisper in her ear.

_Just breathe._

***

She woke in a small cave, protected from the outside skies. She was shivering from the cold, her body aching all over. The last thing she remembered was that voice, and then she blacked out.

She sat up slowly, not pushing her body too hard before standing up. Getting outside of the cave she found she was on a beach, she assumed on the correct incorrect.

“Where are they?” She whispered before a shadow began moving in front of her. It had a humanoid shape to it, although it wasn’t connected to anything. It was a spirit. What she looked like in shadow form, she guessed.

_Sam._

The voice only said one word, but she understood. The shadow would take her to Sam. She began following it, her body too exhausted to even think about shadow walking.

Following the shadow took her to a bay, and her eyes followed a flashing light which was the other side. She remembered the stories the brothers told her, of when Sam would take Nate out of the orphanage at night by giving signals from a torch in Morse code.

_Sic Parvis Magna._

“Sam.” She whispered to herself. “Please, don’t move.” She added, memorising the placement of the flashing torch in her mind and beginning to move towards it in the trees to avoid detection by Rafe's men if they were near.

Judging from how uncomfortable her stomach was, she would say they were.

The sun was just beginning to rise over the horizon, meaning that not too much time was lost. But an entire night was gone. An entire night where Sam, or Nate, could have been captured or killed.

“Oh shit…” She whispered to herself, coming across a group of mercenaries. She had no weapon, none of any use against a group anyway, so she would have to sneak past. She could shadow-walk. She took two deep breaths, steadying her aching chest and allowed her body to disappear. Even though she was surprised that she was able to do it, she still moved quickly in case she couldn’t stay that way for long.

Once at a safe distance an in the coverage of the trees once again, she turned back to her physical body and continued following the spirit in front of her. She didn’t know how long she walked for, but she froze once she heard footsteps in the trees ahead of her. She could only hear one set, so she prepared herself, her hands in front of her body in order to attack.

The spirit that had been leading her disappeared when the person walked through the tree with a gun pointing at her.

“Oh my god, you’re okay.” She breathed, running over to Sam and hugging him.

“I’m fine, we’re both fine,” Sam replied, Caeli looked over Sam’s shoulder, not letting go of him, and saw Nate.

“Oh thank god.” She responded, holding an arm out towards Nate so he could join the hug. He did, albeit a little awkwardly, but Caeli didn’t care. They were safe. For the moment. When the brothers pulled away from her she took a deep breath.

“You look like shit.” Nate joked, she smiled.

“And you don’t?” She responded, noticing the physical distance between the brothers. They had argued. “What happened?” She asked, her eyebrows furrowed in concern, although they didn’t seem to understand the question she had asked. “Did you finally let it all out?” Caeli asked Nate, not angry, just needing to know.

“Let what out?” Nate asked her in response, lying to her.

“You want to go home, don’t you?” She asked to which he didn’t reply, that in itself was good enough as a confirmation of her guess. “I would agree with you, but I don’t know if Sam told you…” Caeli trailed off, looking to Sam and seeing him shake his head.

“He has already reminded me that fifteen years of his life was wasted because of this so don’t try to use-”

“Rafe has your nephew.” Caeli cut Nate off, which made the brother freeze.

“Nephew? I don’t have…” Nate trailed off when he realised that Caeli’s expression was still serious. “No.” Nate covered his mouth with a hand. “You didn’t tell me?” He asked, almost angry with Caeli, she was far too tired to bother retaliating.

“Don’t feel special, Sam didn’t know until two days ago.” She stated quietly, her shoulders slumping before she moved towards a rock and sat down.

“Are you alright?” Sam asked her as Nate was processing what she had said, she shook her head. “They… the Order, they used water against you.” Her weak smile was enough of a reply for him not to push the topic further.

“You two have a son?” Nate questioned, in disbelief as Caeli closed her eyes for a few seconds.

“Yes,” Sam replied for her, which she was grateful for.

“And you expect me to believe that?” Nate asked next, Caeli looked him directly in the eyes.

“I'm sorry I didn’t tell you, alright Nate? I really am, but would you have believed me if I did? If I had told you, you would have tried to get me to look for him and get him back, but look at me, Nate.” She held a hand up and gathered the shadows into her palm as she stood, anger in her eyes. “Do I look like mother material to you? He was better off at an orphanage.”

“He’s your son-”

“And I'm an assassin, when Cassius was born I was being held prisoner by the Order that raised me to be a killer and experimented on me until they got something out of it. He was safer somewhere far away from me, from any of this. I was happy with him being in an orphanage where he would be away from danger, away from people who are trying to kill _us_ , I gave him the Morgan name to help conceal his identity because of that. And then I find out that Rafe has him…” Caeli let the shadows surrounding her hand dissipate before she got too angry. “He’s in danger now, I don’t know how Rafe found him, but he did and now I have no choice but to go after him.”

The Drake brothers fell silent at her words. Neither had seen her so concerned over the wellbeing of another person before, she had never let her emotions show in that capacity before. That’s probably what shocked them into a silence that they didn’t want to break.

“Cassius Morgan?” Nate whispered after a minute, Caeli nodded. “After our mother?”

“Yes.” She replied, looking to the ground. “If you’re worried about an escape plan, I will go and secure one of Rafe’s boats while you two start going further inland to see if we can find Libertalia before Rafe does.”

“To hell, you’re not doing that,” Sam argued, Nate seemed like he agreed with his brother on that front.

“That’s part of what you’re worrying about, correct? Because we no longer have an escape plan because our boat got smashed to pieces by a much larger boat in the middle of a fucking lightning storm?” Caeli checked.

“Well yeah-”

“Then I will get us a boat so we have one, so we have a plan to get out of here if we need to.” She argued, beginning to walk back towards the beach but Nate grabbed her arm.

“We aren’t splitting up again, alright.” He stated with an almost pleading look in his eyes.

“I’ll catch up to you, it won’t take me long-”

“Caeli, we are not splitting up again by choice. I know that you’ve taken down tens of mercenaries before by yourself, you did it just the other week but this is different. We almost died last night, and I don’t know about you but I want to make sure that we are all safe at all times possible. I don’t want to lose either of you, again.” He stated sharply, letting her arm go. She sighed her annoyance.

“Fine.” She snapped, not angry at him but at the situation. She hoped he knew that. As she looked past him to figure out what way to go she saw something through the vines covering a rock. “Oh my god.” She whispered, walking towards it. She pushed the vines away and took a step back. “Avery’s sigil.” She stated the obvious, brushing some dirt off of the stone carving.

“Still wanna go home?” Sam asked but she guessed that the question was directed at Nate.

“Let’s just see what else we find.” She heard the other brother respond before he began leading the way past the vine-covered stone, further into the trees. It was only a few meters down the half-made path when they found first signs of structures, stairs were carved into stone, the wall of a stone house stood before them.

“I’ll be damned,” Nate stated as they came across the wall.

“Off to a good start,” Sam added as if trying to press the point to Nate that this is what they should be doing.

“Yeah, but let’s hope that the rest isn’t buried under centuries worth of dirt and rubble,” Nate responded while jumping through the window of the wall. Caeli had never seen the man so pessimistic before, but then again, she hadn’t seen him after his wife had potentially left him.

“Glass half full, if you please.” Sam joked, which was when she realised that Nate still had no clue of the true way that Sam got out of jail. Caeli moved slower than normal, falling behind at one point just to catch her breath as they continued making their way through the remains of buildings that she hoped were leading them closer to Libertalia. As she walked to catch up she saw Sam ahead, and Nate even further away.

“Never had to wait for you before.” Sam joked, keeping a close eye on the direction that Nate was heading.

“Never gone through what I did last night before.” She responded. “I don’t remember anything after hitting the water, Sam.” She added.

“I'm pretty sure we all don't.” He replied, shaking his head.

“Okay, a small lie, I remember one thing.” She corrected herself, he looked to her with minor concern.

“Caeli…”

“I heard a voice, Sam. Telling me to breathe, to keep calm. Then I lost control of my body, I blacked out.” She told him, her hands shaking. “The voice… I don’t know it, but I feel like whoever it belongs to knows me. I-”

“Guys, up here!” Nate shouted, cutting her off as he stood on top of another remain.

“Whatever’s going on, we’ll figure it out. Okay?” Sam whispered before running towards Nate, she sighed before jogging after him. The voice… the spirit that watched her and helped her… it was someone important, someone who not only cared for her but for the Drakes. She couldn’t shake the feeling that it might be Cassandra.

They jumped through the hole in the roof and walked through a destroyed home, seeing masonry work which confused Caeli. The brother’s discussed the oddity of having a mason on a pirate ship at all, but Caeli just saw it as another factor of proving that this was indeed Libertalia. If you have as much money as these pirates did, affording a mason wouldn’t be a problem. Affording tens of masons wouldn’t be a problem.

“What I wouldn’t give for a camera,” Sam stated, helping her as they finally made it out of the destroyed home. She patted her jacket, feeling the shape of the camera she had brought with them and reached into one of the inside pockets.

“I have one…” She trailed off, pulling it out. It was a small digital camera, not very high quality but it had worked well enough on the small escapades she had been on with varying people in the last three years. She tried to turn it on, but the screen wouldn’t even light up. “Apparently not as waterproof as advertised.” She added, putting it back in her jacket. Nate had always given her shit for this jacket, due to the amount of unnecessary inside pockets, but she was grateful for them now as she grabbed her notebook and pen out as well.

“Not very useful then, is it?” Sam responded.

“Neither are you and yet you’re here.” She joked, a smile on her face as she tucked the notebook back. She was glad she had taken the time to put zips on these pockets, it was surprising how well you could sew when you were taught how to stitch up wounds from a young age.

“I know I normally give you shit for that jacket, but I can see why you put zips on those pockets now,” Nate told her, she smirked.

“Yeah well, would have been more useful if I had kept a gun in one.” Her eyes widened, reaching to her boot and feeling for the dagger she had sheathed in it. A feeling of relief washed over her when she felt the handle.

“Boot knife present?” Sam asked her, she nodded slowly.

“Head’s up!” Caeli heard Nate shout, pushing a crate from a higher floor of the building next to them which crashed into the ground only a couple of meters from Same and Caeli.

“Jesus Christ, Nate!” Caeli shouted.

“What?!” He asked as he jumped down. “We can get through now.” Nate pointed to a hole in one of the walls bordering the area they were in. An old window far too high for any of them to reach without that crate.

“That’s great, but maybe a little warning next time,” Caeli replied.

“I said ‘head’s up’ what more warning do you want?”

“Maybe those same words _before_ you decide to throw a bloody crate at us,” Caeli argued, using the crate to jump up to the exit and looking out at the new view. She looked back at Sam as he followed her, her exhaustion seemed to dissipate when she looked over what she knew was Libertalia.

“You’re going to want to see this,” Sam said, looking back down at Nate before looking to Caeli.

“We found it.” She whispered, looking back at the town and smiling.


	14. Join Me in Paradise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they finally stumble upon Libertalia...

“Whoa.” Was all Nate could manage to whisper when he made it to the same platform that Caeli and Sam were on. Now Caeli thought on it was a floor of a half-destroyed building, that seemed pretty on-trend for what they were finding.

“What do you see?” Sam asked as Caeli’s hands shook from excitement.

“No houses, wide street, clearly a commercial district of some kind…” Nate explained, Sam chuckled and shook his head.

“Yes… thank you for that Nathan. C’mon, what do you see?” Sam asked again, his voice gentle.

“You just want to hear me say it, don’t you?” Nate asked.

“I'm pretty sure that’s exactly what he wants,” Caeli added in, her hands in her jean pockets as they took in what they had found.

“ _Really_ want to hear you say it.” Sam agreed with a smile on his face.

“All right, Libertalia,” Nate responded, although he wasn’t emanating anywhere near as much joy or excitement as Caeli had imagined. Sam began laughing, his excitement clear as he grabbed Nate’s shoulder.

“Libertalia!” He exclaimed, shaking Nate slightly in what Caeli guessed was an action that Sam wanted a reaction from. “The long lost, legendary pirate utopia. Discovered after three-hundred years by one Samuel Drake.” Caeli shot him a look.

“And?” She asked, gesturing to herself and Nate. God damn, that man had always been self-absorbed.

“And his younger, slightly less charming brother who happened to tag along for the ride,” Sam added.

“Um…” Nate trailed off, his head nodding towards Caeli who was almost fuming.

“And the infamous Caeli Porter, assassin, master of shadows, all-round very attractive person and-” Sam finished.

“I can’t believe you sometimes.” She cut him off, the moment of their discovery ruined, so she jumped to the ground and began walking around, looking for anything that could help them find the treasure or Rafe.

“You know, I always knew you’d make something of yourself one day,” Sam said to Nate, the brother’s still on the floor of the building.

“Yeah, just so you know, this isn’t my first lost city,” Nate replied.

“Shh. Just enjoy the moment.” Sam replied and Caeli turned to look back at them.

“You ruined the moment with your narcissism.” She stated simply, staring directly at Sam with her hands raised by her sides.

“I’m not narcissistic-”

“You are trying to convince the wrong people here, Samuel.” She replied to which Sam looked at Nate who avoided eye contact at all costs, proving Caeli’s point.

“Where do you want to start?” Sam asked, realising he wasn’t going to recover his dignity.

“That building over there looks promising,” Caeli stated, pointing to the largest building in the area with one noticeable thing with it.

“You mean the one with the massive guard tower?” Sam asked next, she raised an eyebrow at him.

“Obviously.” She responded bluntly. “Let’s see what was being guarded.” At her words, the brother’s jumped down, and they began walking towards the building.

“A blacksmith…” Caeli whispered as they looked in buildings which piqued their interest.

“Looks like they were making some cutlasses,” Nate said after they walked in to inspect the place.

“Avast, you dirty dog,” Sam said from behind the other two, Caeli and Nate turned around to see the older brother holding a cutlass towards them… at least before the blade fell clean off from the handle.

“Quality obviously wasn’t very good,” Caeli responded to Nate’s observation previously as Sam stared at the blade that was now lying on the ground, then back to the handle which was still in his grasp.

“Nice,” Nate said as he looked at the same things.

“I was doing the…”

“Oh yeah, no, we know,” Caeli responded, smiling at the situation.

“That was doing a thing…” Sam tried to recover, but it wasn’t working.

“Right…” Nate replied and Caeli crossed her arms as he spoke. Sam looked utterly defeated at that moment, making Caeli laugh.

“You’re a horrible pirate,” Caeli stated before she walked out of the building, continuing their trek towards the overly large building in the semi-close distance. Although she lost the boys only a couple of minutes later, only realising once she found what had been a stable which housed at least six horse skeletons, all still tied up.. “Why do they never tell me where they’re going?” She whispered to herself, looking around for any evidence of which building they may have gone into…

“ _We’re not splitting up again by choice_ my ass,” Caeli added, remembering Nate’s words from just over an hour ago, but found the brother’s in a two-storey building, sitting on chairs talking. She could feel the weight of the conversation in the air, the tension already sat on her chest, although they weren’t angry…

“No, but I mean… what would our lives have been like if we hadn’t started chasing these people who’ve been dead for hundreds of years?” Nate asked and Caeli made sure she was hidden behind a wall as she closed her eyes. She had tried to keep herself from thinking down the path that Nate was following, what could have been if different choices had been made or if certain actions had or hadn’t been taken. It brought more heartache to think on them, so she kept herself from doing so. “You think it would resemble more of a normal life?” Nate added, and while she wanted to stop them from overthinking it there she was also interested in what Sam would respond with.

“Hmm… normal.” Sam took a deep breath in. “You’ve got everybody gathered around the table for thanksgiving, exchanging all the baby photos, something like that?” Sam asked while Caeli let her mind run to imagine that picture, of them all happy, safe and together. Having normal lives. While it brought her joy it also made her feel ill in the pit of her stomach. It didn’t sit right with her. “No. No thank you.” She was almost grateful to hear Sam add those words. “I mean, a normal life with Caeli… with Cassius too… I threw any chance of that out the window a long time ago.”

“What do you mean?” Nate asked, and Caeli’s eyes shot open again, keeping her breathing silent as she rested her head against the wall. He was going to tell Nate about the argument. About ending their relationship.

“You never wondered why she left Panama?” Sam asked, and while she wanted to see what his expression was like, she didn’t want him to know she was listening.

“You said everything was fine…” Nate trailed off, there was a pause as she imagined Sam shaking his head.

“We argued… for the fourth time about leaving everything behind and starting a normal life. That time it was different, there was something that was different about how she was acting, why she was adamant on leaving Panama right then and abandoning everything. But I couldn’t, I couldn’t leave. This was Mum’s work…”

“Caeli was pregnant…” Nate trailed off, realising why she had wanted to stop then.

“I didn’t know, I just thought it was for our safety. I should’ve known there was something else but I was too focused on the treasure. Because of that argument, she was alone and she was kidnapped by the Order, and then she wasn’t there to help us when we needed it.”

“She never told me,” Nate responded.

“She probably didn’t want you to know, she probably never forgave herself for what happened, the same as me.” There was silence for a moment, she walked out with her hands in her pockets and a smile on her face, acting as if she hadn’t heard a word of what was spoken.

“Wondered where you boys ran off to.” She stated, looking at the beer tankards in their hands. “How was the service?” She asked, lightening the mood with a joke.

“Pretty lousy actually,” Sam responded, also with a fake smile on his face.

“Oh, I thought the reviews for this place were amazing…” She joked, Nate laughed and stood up from his seat. “Next building over was a stable, there were still horse skeletons in there.”

“Unsurprising…” Nate trailed off.

“They were still tied up like they had been abandoned.” She added that confused the brothers as much as it did her.

“Why?” Sam asked.

“Unfortunately, none of them could tell me so I'm about as in the dark as you are.” She replied, a smirk on her face. “All I can tell is that something happened here. Something bad, I can feel it. I mean, no one leaves horses tied up to die by choice.”

“Well, I guess we’ll find out what happened, or take an educated guess once we get more clues,” Nate responded, jumping from the collapsed flooring down to the ground again, the other two followed him.

“I know I’ve joked about cursed pirate treasure, but after hearing all of your stories…” Sam spoke as they walked.

“Well, the simplest explanation is usually the correct one… _usually_.” Nate replied which made Sam look to Caeli.

“Don’t look at me, I was only at Iram of the Pillars.” She responded, pressing forward. They found a marking, which seemed to be another sigil painted on walls and more evidence of something terrible happening. An underground tunnel, for example, one that seemed to have been built in a rush. They eventually came out and faced another mass amount of mercenaries, as they hid in tall grass the three-banded together to discuss how to move forward.

“Trying to kill them all probably won’t end well, I mean, we could do it but then Rafe and Nadine will know where we are. That seems more important, that our location isn’t known by them. That way we have the element of surprise.” Caeli whispered, then looking across the section of buildings to the next safe space.

“It’s going to be difficult getting across this without getting spotted and shot at,” Nate responded, Sam looked Caeli in the eyes.

“Could you shadow us?”

“I don’t even know how I managed to do it with you… two people could be a little out of my reach.” She responded.

“Could you try?” Sam asked next, she sighed, grabbing both of their shoulders but taking neither of them with her to the shadows.

“I could probably take one of you at a time,” Caeli stated, the brothers looked to each other and had a quick, silent conversation.

“Alright, we’ll do that. Take Nate first.” Sam stated, Caeli didn’t hesitate, immediately grabbing Nate’s shoulder and shadow-walking to the safe place she had seen before.

“Wait,” Nate whispered before Caeli was going to go back for Sam.

“What?” She asked, her heart beating faster than it should have been.

“Why didn’t you tell me? About you and Sam breaking up?” Nate asked she looked away from him for a split second before looking back.

“Because it didn’t matter, we thought he was dead and I didn’t want to change whatever kind of image you had of him painted in your memories. No good would have come from it, besides, we’ve had the chance to talk it through now, it’s like nothing ever happened.” She replied, smiling at him before sinking back to the shadows and grabbing Sam, wondering why it was so easy to take the both of the brothers into the shadows with her.

While that was the case it was short-lived, and she ended up having to shadow them across another section filled with mercenaries. It was safe to say she was getting tired.

“You okay?” Sam asked her as she put her hands on her knees to catch her breath.

“Yeah, just give me two seconds,” she responded, Nate looked at her with concern.

“Okay, no more shadow-walking.” The younger brother instructed.

“No argument from me,” Caeli replied, smiling before standing up again, it was some more precarious jumping and rope swinging later that they finally ended up at the treasury building. Although, the courtyard wasn’t a very welcoming sight.

“Holy shit,” Caeli swore, looking at all of the human remains that filled the courtyard, all leading towards the treasury. There were piles of wooden carriages, flags and anything imaginable she guessed were used as barricades for whoever was attacking…

“I guess we found our missing colonists, well, some of them anyway,” Sam responded.

“I told you something happened here,” Caeli replied, looking at him from the corner of her eye.

“Never said you were wrong.” He stated as Nate continued assessing the battlefield.

“Cannons, improvised barricades… what the hell happened here?” He asked, Caeli was beginning to hear whispers in her mind, but most were unintelligible. The spirits of these bodies were still here, they weren’t resting. Not until what happened here was known. They only whispered one word that she could understand… _Avery._

“Some kind of battle,” Sam stated the obvious.

“It’s a rhetorical question. The real question is who’s fighting who? And why?” Nate replied so Sam went to inspect one of the skeletons.

“Some of these bodies are dressed a bit more fancy. Look like soldiers.”

 _Avery._ The whispers kept pushing themselves into her mind, distracting her.

“So it was the colonists versus the soldiers…”

_Avery._

“And if that’s the treasury up there…” Sam began running to the stone building.

“Then it appears someone was trying to make a withdrawal,” Nate added, following his brother. Caeli did so too.

“Yeah, let’s just hope they didn’t succeed,” Sam responded, and Caeli looked to Nate.

“Right.” Nate didn’t sound like he fully agreed, but they moved on anyway. The whispers continued making no sense to her, just repeating Avery’s name again and again.

“Some more information would useful.” She whispered under her breath, looking at one of the skeletons on the grand staircase leading up to the doors. She took extra care to make sure she didn’t step on a single bone before looking into the entrance hallway, marble statues of angel women were inside, styled to look like ship figureheads. “This is impressive.” She stated, looking to Nate who was pulling a lever in hopes it would open the door.

It unlocked but stayed closed.

Caeli walked to the doors and grabbed onto them.

“Need a hand?” Sam asked, she didn’t reply and simply pushed, her above-average strength enough to open the heavy doors by herself. As soon as she did she noticed a silence, the whispers had stopped.

And the treasury seemed to be void of anything of value. Sam looked around in disbelief before stating the words none of them wanted to hear.

“It’s empty.”


	15. The Treasured Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the Drake brothers and Caeli enter the treasury only to be bitterly disappointed...

“It’s empty,” Sam stated, and while the brother’s focused on that for a moment too long, Caeli was already looking up and seeing why the whispers had stopped. A statue of Avery was positioned in a cut out on the far wall, but it was missing its head… and to add to that, each portrait of the founding Captains of Libertalia had ‘thief’ painted over them.

“Of course it is,” Nate replied to his brother, Caeli moving further into the room to get a better look at the statue.

“You think it was Rafe?” She heard Sam asked, and that was where she lost interest in the conversation, finding the head of the Avery statue on the ground at the other end of the room. She then looked at the bodies that lie impaled on the ground, seeing armour with Avery’s sigil on the front.

“Some kind of uniform…” She trailed off, looking up at the portraits again before running around and checking drawers, finding pieces of paper that seemed to be manifests and recordings of what had once been in this room, placing them into her notebook before hearing Sam call for them both. She ran to him, seeing him picking something up.

“What’ve you got?” Nate asked and Sam flicked a coin to his brother.

“Libertalia money,” Sam answered, Nate inspected it.

“This has Avery’s sigil on it…” Nate trailed off.

“Mhm,” Sam responded.

“He must have melted down the gold, minted his own currency,” Caeli stated as Nate handed it to her.

“So, based on that, all the manifests on the shelves… the treasure was her," Sam stated, Caeli looked around.

“Yeah, but that leaves the bigger question… where is it now?” Nate asked as Caeli reprocessed everything.

“Okay, so we know that there was fighting outside…” She started, pointing towards the door they had entered through.

“Yeah and inside.” Nate pointed out.

“What, you think the colonists stole it?”  Sam asked, trying to figure out what happened here was seeming to become more and more complicated by the minute. Caeli looked up to the portraits again.

“No, I think they were trying to reclaim what was theirs…” Caeli trailed off, looking back at the brothers before pointing up at the portraits. “Look, here’s Avery, Tew…” She pointed to two and then turned around to look behind them. “All of these people are the founders of Libertalia. All marked ‘thief’. Specifically ‘thief’. Not ‘murderer’, not ‘tyrant’.”

“ ‘Thief’,” Sam stated again. “So, by the time the colonists busted in here, the treasure was already gone.”

“Yeah, because these guys had already taken it for themselves,” Caeli stated sharply, catching Sam’s eyes. She wasn’t sure what expression he wore, but she knew it wasn’t a joyful one.

“Pirates will be pirates, right?” Nate said, beginning to walk away.

“Yeah, pirates will be pirates…” Sam agreed, there was a pause for a moment or two, a silence filling the room as whispers began to creep their way to Caeli’s ears again. “Huh.” She turned to look at Sam as he sounded like he had an idea. “I think I know where they moved it.”

_New Devon. Avery._

“What? Where?” Nate asked so Sam pointed up at the ceiling. Caeli hadn’t looked that high yet, but now she saw a map painted on the semi-destroyed ceiling. “It’s a map,” Nate stated the obvious.

“Yeah, right there…” He pointed to the section of the map that was just above them. “That’s our treasury.” Where they were right now, a good starting place.

“This… it’s a map of Libertalia.” Once again Nate was stating the obvious.

“Right, so follow it to the other side of the island and look, right there.” Sam pointed to another section of the map, under painted mansions were two words. ‘New Devon’.

“New Devon,” Nate stated. “Wait, Avery was from Devon, England.”

“He sure was,” Sam confirmed Nate’s statement, Caeli stepped back as the whispers continued weighing down on her.

_Avery. Avery. Avery._

“Man, those are some seriously large mansions,” one of the brothers stated, Caeli wasn’t too focused on it as she closed her eyes and tried to focus.

“Each of them has it’s own sigil too.”

_Avery._

“Because that’s where they lived.”

_Avery. Stole. Killed._

“What do you say, we climb that watchtower, huh? Get our bearings?”

_Avery._

“New Devon, here we come.”

_Avery. Killed._

“Shut up.” She whispered, running her hands over her hair and letting her head fall forward. “Unless you have something more useful than that, just shut up and let me focus.” She whispered.

“Shut up?” Sam asked and she looked up from the ground towards him.

“Not you, I… it’s a long story.” She stated.

“What’s going on?” Nate asked, now with both of them focused on her she couldn’t just change the subject.

“Nothing, don’t worry about-”

“Too late for that,” Sam stated simply, she shook her head.

“I keep hearing whispers… of the people who died here. They keep telling me it was Avery, but that’s all their saying, it’s just his name over and over again.” She stated, noticing the lack of their whispers now. They might have actually listened to her.

“Why are you hearing whispers?” Sam asked next, Caeli looked to Nate for any kind of backup but he seemed to be waiting for her to explain instead.

“My powers.” She stated simply, hoping that would be enough.

“Shadows… they don’t tie to any kind of whispering or voices in my experience, Caels.” Sam replied to which she rolled her eyes.

“I tell people I am tied to shadows, they find it less shocking than when I say that I am actually tied to spirits, to death and darkness. Shadow-form is a nice way of saying spirit-form, which I believe is only possible for me and for you guys to come with me, because we have all basically died, or come very close to it.” She responded, watching him slowly nod his head.

“What you were trying to tell me earlier…”

“A spirit got control of my body and saved me from drowning. I heard a voice talking to me, trying to calm me while I absolutely freaked out in the ocean.” She looked to Nate and looked back to Sam. “The voice isn’t familiar to me, but there was a spirit who led to the both of you again. I don’t know who the spirit belongs to, but it knows you both and cares about you a lot. I know that. She cares about me because of my connection to you. I think… it might be…” She trailed off, not wanting to say it out loud, just in case she was bringing false hope to them.

“You think it might be our mother?” Nate asked, unsure if that was where Caeli was going.

“Possibly, I can’t think of anyone else it might be. Her voice is the only thing I have, I can’t describe it you, I just know what she felt like, her personality, who she was and is, what her purpose was and is. She wants to protect both of you, she feels deeply sorry for being unable to throughout the rest of your lives, she feels sorry for what happened to you after she died. She blames herself, even though there was nothing she could have done.” She explained. “There is a deep love for you two, and from what you two have told me, there isn’t really anyone else who it could be.”

“Mum’s here with us?” Sam asked and Caeli couldn’t do anything aside from nod. “Let’s not fuck this up then.” He stated, beginning to climb one of the shelves in order to get height so they could get out of the treasury and to the watchtower. The quickest route seemed to be through the massive hold in the roof and partially spread to a wall.

“Not what I was going for but…” Caeli trailed off, looking to Nate who had an unreadable expression on his face. “Let’s go.” The brother snapped back to the real world then, nodding before following Sam’s path. It took some climbing of very unsafe looking bars to reach the top of the tower, but once they did reach the top she felt she could breathe again.

“Woah, quite the crow’s nest, huh?” Nate asked rhetorically, Caeli nodded, taking in the view for a second.

“There it is.” She heard Sam’s voice state, she looked towards where he was pointing. “Just on the other side of the river.”

“Well, what do you say we go and rob from the rich?” Nate asked to which Caeli smiled before going to begin the descent down the tower for what would be the expected few hours trip to New Devon. Suddenly a pain hit her gut.

Danger.

“WATCH OUT!”


	16. The Treasured Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which everything goes to shit...

“WATCH OUT!” She shouted as loud as she could, a bomb hitting the tower and exploding, the deafening boom covered her warning, and instead, she scanned the distance. “RPG!” she shouted, hearing both of the brothers swearing.

She took two breaths, a second bomb hitting the tower.

Both of the brothers were in the tower… she shadowed next to Sam.

“I’ll take them out, get out of the tower.” She shadowed away from him before he could protest and she immediately began stabbing arteries, taking rifles and stealing RPG’s. She tried to stay ahead of the brother’s, trying to take out as many mercenaries as she could before they would even have a chance to shoot at the brothers…

Until Nadine came into the mix, Nate had come across her first, Sam second and Caeli had come into the fight last, although she gave the brothers a much-earned break.

“You know Nadine…” Caeli said to get the woman’s attention. “I’ve waited a long time for this.” She stated, the brothers both hunched in pain and now heading towards a door. They knew Caeli could handle this herself.

“You want to know something, Porter… I have too.” She responded, jumping towards Caeli and throwing a fist towards Caeli’s face. Caeli deflected the punch and threw her own into Nadine’s stomach, winding the woman before Nadine swung at her again. She ducked, looking to the brothers for a moment. They were standing and watching.

“Get the hell out of here!” She shouted to them, they didn’t hesitate to run to the next room. Caeli ducked under a kick that Nadine was sending to her chin and round kicking her back in the ribs. Nadine finally landed a punch on Caeli’s cheek, Caeli groaned but retaliated without hesitation, punching Nadine in the nose, kicking her in the chest and throwing her against a wall.

“I don’t know what you have against the Drakes, but if you know that we are the better option to go with to find this treasure… you’re an absolute moron to not switch sides. I can guarantee you, your mercenaries don’t give a shit about you and will double-cross you.” Caeli stated.

“You don’t know my men,” Nadine responded, Caeli sighed and shook her head.

“I think I know them better than you do,” Caeli replied. “They’re mercenaries, Nadine, they are here for the money. If Rafe wants to keep going but you try and pull out, they will go with Rafe. You know I'm right.” She added, taking a step away from Nadine. She could see that she had hit a fuse, Nadine was furious.

“You don’t know anything!” She shouted, launching towards Caeli who dodged attack after attack before she saw Nate flying through the air and landing a punch on Nadine.

“What the fuck are you doing?!” Caeli shouted once the floor beneath them started to crack. Sam was back in the room too, she threw her arms up. “Do you either of you ever bloody well listen to me?!” She shouted next before the floor broke underneath them, sending them tumbling down a floor, and then through the next storey’s floor before they landed on a what she guessed used to be a courtyard. It was now the top of what seemed to be a cliff, with a gun close to her. The boys began crawling towards it, whereas she was more focused on Nadine as she went and kicked Nate in the stomach, she then turned to Sam, who already had the gun in his hands.

“You’re fast, but you’re not that fast,” Sam stated, Nadine couldn’t argue, and so she stood down.

“Hey, forget about her.” Nate started, Caeli agreed with him.

“We need to get out of here before they-”

“Shit.” Sam cut Caeli off as Rafe and two mercenaries came through the building they were next to. Sam took Nadine hostage while Nate held his hands out as if it would calm Rafe and the mercenaries who had guns trained on each of them.

“Let’s just all calm down,” Caeli said carefully, watching Sam’s pained face, looking to Rafe and seeing his anger… there was a lot of tension in the air.

“Well… this is interesting.” Rafe stated, his gun pointed at Caeli while the mercenaries were pointing at the brothers. “Nate. Samuel. Caeli.”

“Put your guns down, all of you.” Sam tried to bargain as Caeli let the shadows reach her body. Her fingers were slowly turning black, her veins beginning to darken as well.

“No,” Rafe responded.

“Rafe, this guy’s on edge,” Nadine stated, you could tell that she was worried about her life.

“Oh, don’t worry about him, Nadine. These guys don’t kill anyone in cold blood. It’s not their style.” Rafe stated, looking to Nadine for a second before looking back to Caeli. “If _she_ was pointing the gun to your head I’d be a little more worried, but she wouldn’t do it either… not in front of her own son.” Rafe stared directly into Caeli’s eyes. “Cass…” He trailed off, a teenage boy came out from the building, looking at Caeli before looking at the rest of the situation. He stood closest to Rafe, a clear sense of trust between them.

Caeli could barely breathe as she looked at the boy, the shadows that had been gathering at her fingertips suddenly disappearing. He had her eyes, her grey eyes that unsettled so many people, he had Sam’s face, his hair a deep brown which could have come from either of his parents.

“Cassius…” Caeli whispered, Nate watched her as she instinctively took a step forward but the other mercenaries pointed their guns towards her as well. She stepped back again, seeming to remember where she was and the situation she was in. “Sam put the gun down.” She stated darkly, knowing what Rafe was capable of if they didn’t comply.

“Don’t take one more step…” Sam stated as Rafe took a step towards him.

“Oh, you mean… like this?” Rafe asked as he took another step. Caeli saw the situation ending very badly, and so she took a step towards Sam.

“Don’t do it, put the gun down,” Caeli whispered. “You kill her and we all die.” She added, but it wasn’t enough. She saw his muscles twitch and jumped towards him, pulling his arm and aiming the gun behind them as he squeezed the trigger. She took the weapon from him and threw it towards Rafe who had jumped with his hands up in front of the mercenaries who were about to shoot.

“Don’t shoot them!” He shouted, and Cassius jumped.

“It’s done… okay? It’s done.” Caeli shrunk under the stare that Sam was sending her, it was so heavy… so angry. He would get over it. He had to.

“ _Don’t worry Nadine. It’s not their style._ ” Nadine mocked what Rafe had said only a minute earlier, her anger clear.

“What can I say, I didn’t think he had it in him,” Rafe responded, shrugging his shoulders. Caeli was glad that guns were no longer being pointed around, but she didn’t want to risk going to Cassius with the mercenaries there. She didn’t know what they would do.

“Samuel, you okay?” Rafe asked as he walked towards the older brother. “I guess you knew this moment was coming, huh?” He asked next before hitting Sam across the face with the handle of his gun. Caeli immediately dropped next to Sam, going to help him stand back up as Nate also jumped towards them.

“Hey!” Nate shouted. “C’mon man.” He added, Rafe then pointed the gun towards Nate. “You already got us, take it easy. C’mon now, you’re a businessman, let’s just… work out a deal.”

“Oh, a deal. I’d love to hear what you have in mind.” Rafe responded, the tone prompted Caeli to take a step to be between Nate and Rafe, she didn’t want him getting shot if talking Rafe down didn’t work. She was guessing it wouldn’t when Rafe walked over to Sam and kicked him in the head. Caeli had to choose her battles, Rafe wouldn’t shoot Sam, Rafe wanted Sam to suffer… Rafe would be most likely to shoot her or Nate. Most probably Nate, if Cassius had any kind of impact on the situation. “Oh, you can go ahead. I'm listening.”

“Alright, just…” Nate helped Sam stand up as Caeli still kept herself between Rafe and both of the brothers now. “Alright, you want to find Avery’s treasure? We’ll help you find it.”

“And in exchange I let you live?” Rafe asked and Caeli’s eyes widened as soon as she knew where Nate was going with the bargain.

“Yeah… that… and a small cut.” Nate stated which prompted Rafe to laugh.

“The gauchos on this guy,” Rafe said, joking with the mercenaries.

“Just enough to get him his freedom okay?” Nate asked, Caeli held a hand back towards Nate, her eyes shifting to Sam.

“His freedom?” Rafe asked.

“Nathan…” Sam tried to get his brother to stop, but it clearly didn’t work.

“Yeah, he did hard time, okay? Our time. And the guy who broke him out, Hector Alcazar, he owes him a lot of money.” Nate stated, Caeli had to take a step sideways to be able to look at Sam properly, her eyebrows furrowed.

“Whoa. What the hell are you talking about, Nate?” Rafe asked and Sam looked directly into Caeli’s eyes.

“I knew this would happen.” She whispered, shaking her head.

“Hector Alcazar died in a shootout in Argentina like six months ago,” Rafe stated the truth about the situation. “I'm the one that got Samuel out.”

“What?” Nate asked, looking to Sam as Caeli turned her focus back to Rafe.

“Oh. Wow, what did he tell you?” Rafe asked, his eyes flicking between Caeli and Nate. “Sam, what kind of story did you cook up? Alcazar? Really? You lied? You lied to your baby brother and your ex? Although judging from Caeli’s face, I think she probably figured it out.”

“We’re wasting time.” Nadine cut in, shaking Caeli’s attention from her twitching fingers and making her remember that Cassius was watching all of this unfold. What an introduction to the family.

“Just a second.” Rafe snapped. “Thing is Nate, I never stopped looking for Avery’s treasure. I just kept running into these dead ends, you know? And then I hear that our dear old Samuel Drake, an authority on Avery, is alive and somewhat well. There was no breakout. I bribed the prison warden and your brother just waltzed right out the front gate. He spent the last two years tracking down the second St. Dismas cross, at the simple cost of seeing that Caeli was alive with his own eyes.”

Caeli’s attention snapped back to Sam. He knew she was alive… and he never came to her?

“I guess you didn’t know that part, did you?” Rafe asked her, she didn’t reply, her stare cold and expressionless as he turned to look back at Nate. “But, you know what? He did all of that with me.”

“No.” Nate was simply in denial, and Caeli didn’t blame him.

“Oh yeah.” Rafe retaliated.

“No, that’s bullshit.”

“Sam, care to refute?” Rafe asked, walking away from them again and back towards Cassius. Sam took a couple of deep breaths before looking at his brother.

“Nate…”

“Aw Sam. Ah, Jesus, no, no…” Nate could barely believe it, he took a step backwards.

“Listen, Avery’s treasure was ours, it was always ours,” Sam stated, walking towards Nate and grabbing his shoulder, Nate pushed him off.

“No, I left my life for you!” Nate shouted and Rafe began laughing as Caeli’s family began falling apart in front of her.

“Hey Nate, if it’s any consolation he duped me too. Pulled a Houdini on me, he brought you, that old man and Caeli back into the mix. Not gonna lie Sam, that really… pissed me off. But you know, all behind us now.” Rafe stated, then turning to look at Caeli. “You’re awfully quiet.” She didn’t say anything, not when her family could be shot at any given moment.

“You don’t deserve it,” Sam stated.

“You do?” Rafe retaliated, obviously talking about the treasure. “Last I checked we were all a bunch of thieves digging around where we shouldn’t.”

“Rafe.” Nadine interrupted again.

“What?”

“One way or another, end it, or I will,” Nadine stated.

“Well, you heard the lady.” Rafe started, Caeli’s gut began to give her pain again as Rafe pointed the gun towards Sam.

“Hey, one missed clue and you can kiss the treasure goodbye,” Nate stated, but Caeli’s stomach was telling her that it was not helping. “You said it yourself, you keep running into dead ends. Why don’t you face it, Rafe, you need us.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” Rafe stated, and although he acted like he was agreeing to the situation she knew that nothing was alleviated. “You’re half right. I just need Sam.” Rafe lifted the gun towards Nate.

“Wait now, you’re making a mistake, you got-“ Caeli ran to try and get between Rafe and the brothers but was too late. Rafe pulled the trigger as Sam stepped in front of Nate, the bullet tore into Sam’s shoulder, forcing his body backwards and caused him to bump into his brother.

The bump into Nate sent him over the edge of the cliff.

“Nathan!”


	17. 'till death do you part

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we flashback to a night in Vegas...

 

_If she was truly honest, Caeli wasn’t entirely sure as to why she and Sam were even in Vegas anymore. The lead they had actually had no useful information for them, and yet here they were, still in the casino they had met the lead in, watching as people gambled their money away._

_“Why don’t we go?” Caeli asked Sam. “That guy was useless, we need to move on.” She stated, he looked like he was actually thinking about it for a moment._

_“Or, we could stay…” He trailed off, running his hands down her bare arms before holding her hands. “Have some fun.” He added, a small smile on his face._

_“We have a treasure to find.” Caeli reminded him, Sam nodded before he looked around the room._

_“The treasure isn’t going anywhere, Caels. We are in our twenties, in Vegas… and you don’t want to have fun?” He asked her, she rolled her eyes._

_“Gambling isn’t my definition of fun.” She responded, raising an eyebrow at him. “Why are you so keen on this?” She asked him next, aware that they were still holding hands._

_“Because I don’t want to miss out on anything, a night a Vegas should be spent making regrettable decisions and gambling and drinking and spur of the moment marriages and… everything I haven’t had a chance to do yet. That neither of us has had the chance to do yet.” He told her, she sighed and looked to the ground before meeting his eyes again._

_“No gambling.” She stated, he smiled._

_“No gambling it is.” He responded, seeming excited about the night ahead. “Drinking though?”_

_“Of course drinking, what else are we supposed to do?” She replied, walking them both to the exit of the casino. They went from bar to bar that night, drinking what they could and ending up in front of a building that they stared at for far too long._

_“We shouldn’t…” Caeli trailed off, staring at the chapel. She wasn’t sure as to how they had gotten there, a good portion of the night was condensed into a blur, her fingers numb with the amount of alcohol in her system._

_“We’ve been together for how long now?” Sam asked her, an arm around her shoulders as she shook from the cold. In her small dress without a jacket, she was feeling the dropping temperatures. Sam was in a suit, he had given her his jacket about an hour ago, but it only did so much when her legs were still open to the elements._

_“Two and a half years, thanks for remembering.” She responded he chose to ignore the snide comment at the end of her sentence._

_“People have gotten married with less than that. Hell, people get married in Vegas after one night.” Sam replied, seeming adamant on this happening._

_“Yeah but people forget that Vegas marriages are actually legally binding,” Caeli replied, sobering up with every minute that was passing._

_“But we haven’t forgotten that,” Sam responded, turning to look at her with his hands on her shoulders. “You love me right?” He asked and she furrowed her eyebrows._

_“At the moment I'm not entirely sure.” She replied which triggered Sam to roll his eyes._

_“I love you, and you love me. What else do you need to get married?” He asked her, she shook her head._

_“Marriage is an outdated ceremony that was used to pass ownership of a daughter to a new male. Why would I want to partake in anything like that?” She asked him, he had a shocked look on his face._

_“I'm not going to own you…” he trailed off, his words beginning to slur. “… if anything,_ you’d _own_ my _ass.” He added. “Anyway, people get married now as a declaration of love for each other. So, Caeli Porter…” he used her body to hold his weight as he got down onto one knee._

_“You better not be-”_

_“Will you do me the honours of letting me become your husband?” He asked, cutting her off as he tilted his head to the side. Although they were both drunk as hell he seemed to have a kind of clarity in his eyes, he knew exactly what he was doing._

_“Samuel-”_

_“That’s not sounding like a ‘yes’.” Sam cut her off in a disappointed tone, going to stand up again._

_“Samuel.” She repeated his name and he looked into her eyes, she helped him stand up. “We are both too drunk for this shit, but…” his eyes lit up. “…why not? Let’s go in there and get married and not tell a single bloody soul about it because Sully will not let us hear the end of it. Neither will your brother.”_

_“Good point. Just between us then.” He replied, going to walk into the chapel before looking back at her again. “Rings… we don’t have rings. We need rings.”_

_“We can get them after, come on,” Caeli stated, grabbing his hand and pulling him towards the chapel. There wasn’t much paperwork and they were in front of the minister ready to exchange vows within an hour._

_“We are here today to marry one Caeli Porter and one Samuel Drake, to make two into one.” The minister began, addressing the whole three other people that were in the room. “I have been told to make this quick, so we will go to the vows. Samuel…”_

_“Caeli, the first time we met will always be clear in my mind. You were going to shoot me, I'm kind of glad you didn’t. That day sparked a long chain of events that lead to us being here tonight… and throughout it all, we were always honest with each other, about who we are. Even before we got together, you never hid from me, I thought you might have been acting like you hated me because you were trying to pretend that you didn’t like me… turned out you actually hated me at the start. But that’s okay, that changed, I would like to say it’s because of my charm but we both know that never worked on you.” He said and they ignored the look of confusion coming from the minister and the witness._

_“The point of what I'm trying to say is… around you I can be myself, I feel absolutely comfortable with the idea of not holding up any walls to keep you from me. I always felt that way. That’s what kept me drawn to you, it’s what keeps me with you. I keep finding out more about you, it helps me continue to fall in love with you. Even though we are bound to change I will still love you no matter what happens, I always will.” He finished, Caeli smiled and held his hands, squeezing them._

_“Caeli…” The minister said her name, signalling that it was her turn._

_“Samuel… I never hated you, I disliked you, yes, never hated. Just making that clear.” She looked to the minister for a second before locking eyes with Sam again. “But everything that happened from there wasn’t because of your charm, you’re right on that front. It was because no matter what I showed you of myself, no matter what I revealed from my past, you accepted me. You always accepted me for who I am, you never asked me to change, you pushed me to open myself up to you because you could see how much I was fighting against myself to do so. I love you, not because you tried so hard to get me to fall for you, but because in doing so you tore down my walls, you didn’t give me a choice as to whether I would let you in or push you away. You fought for me and I’ve never had anyone do that for me before. That’s why I love you and will always love you.”_

_“Now, do you, Samuel Drake, take this woman, Caeli Porter, to be your lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold, in sickness and in health, in good times and woe, for richer or poorer, keeping yourself unto her, ‘till death do you part?”_

_“I do,” Sam responded, and Caeli could feel her chest tighten, it wasn’t from anxiety, she was nervous. About what, she didn’t know._

_“And do you, Caeli Porter, take this man, Samuel Drake, to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold, in sickness and in health, in good times and woe, for richer or poorer, keeping yourself unto him, ‘till death do you part?”_

_“I do.” She replied._

_“You don’t have rings, do you?” The minister whispered and Samuel shook his head in reply. “I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss the bride.” Sam didn’t hesitate to hold Caeli’s face and kissed her hard, she held his neck and kissed back, they broke apart and reconnected, Caeli biting Sam’s lip as they pulled away again. For a moment they forgot they were in a chapel as Sam groaned and grabbed Caeli’s ass. The minister had to cough to remind them that there were other people in the room with them._

_“Sorry…” Caeli apologised, smiling as she suddenly felt different. Although she had already seen the Drakes as her family, it seemed to be solidified now. She felt like she truly belonged with them._

_They signed the papers and on the way back to the hotel room they stopped at a jewellery store, buying a simple set of wedding bands and immediately putting them on, Caeli bought a silver chain to wear the ring on once they would meet back up with Sully and Nate. She never took that chain off, not until the night of the argument where she had left it in Sam’s room. That was how she had gotten it back after Iram of the Pillars, Nate had gone into the hotel room that she and Sam had shared, taking their belongings, being careful with the ring on the silver chain and gave it to her along with her other things once they got back to America._

_He never asked what the ring was for, nor did he seem to want to know._

_Their marriage was always kept a secret, just as it had been intended to be._


	18. The Founders

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Caeli finds out truths about what happened in Libertalia and about her son...

“Nathan!” Sam shouted, Caeli jumped towards the ledge that the younger brother had just fallen over, her hand already dipping into the shadows to go and make sure that Nate was okay.

“Don’t.” She froze as she heard Rafe’s voice, her hand returning back to its normal colour. She didn’t move a muscle. “Don’t go after him. You have too much to lose.” Caeli turned around to look at Rafe, he was pointing his gun at Sam, the mercenaries behind him were pointing theirs at Cassius.

“I dare you,” Caeli whispered, taring Rafe directly in the eyes.

“Excuse me?” Rafe stated.

“I said, I dare you,” Caeli stated with a new kind of conviction.

“You want to run that risk? Lose the _love of your life_ and your son?” Rafe asked as if she was crazy.

“You’re seeing this the wrong way, Rafe.” She told him, stepping towards him and letting her eyes turn dark with the shadows. “I may lose them, but… you do too. You lose the security of them because as soon as they are either safe or dead, there will be nothing keeping me from you. I will unleash everything I have onto you, the screams, the darkness, the fear I can push onto you… you will regret ever _touching_ my family.” She told him, her hands shaking with anger. Rafe started clapping, a smile on his face.

“Great performance Caeli.” He stated, putting his gun into its holster. “Now, we have Avery’s treasure to find…”

“My son,” Caeli stated, looking and seeing the mercenaries still pointing their guns at Cassius. The boy turned and saw the guns pointing at him, he turned to look at Rafe with an angry look on his face.

“You said you wouldn’t hurt me.” The boy stated, his anger turning into a look of betrayal. Caeli was shocked to hear his voice.

“Yeah, well, I lied,” Rafe responded.

“Cassius-” Caeli went to speak to him.

“Not a word.” Rafe cut her off. “Reunions can come later.” He added, Caeli tilted her head to the side and kept her mouth shut, watching Rafe with too much intent, intimidating him by simply looking at him. “Now let’s get moving, Sam would you be so kind as to tell us where we’re going?” Sam kept silent, his eyes flicking back to the cliff his brother had just fallen over. “Tell us, or the boy dies,” Rafe stated next, pointing his own gun at Cassius.

“New Devon,” Caeli stated, blurting it out with her hands up. “We need to go to New Devon, which is where the captains built all of their mansions. North.” She explained further, her eyes flicking between Rafe and Cassius. The kid was actually looking afraid like he was actually being betrayed by Rafe. It didn’t seem to be an act.

“You said you wouldn’t hurt me,” Cassius repeated his same line, this time his voice sounded truly broken.

“And I told you I lied, kid. Now get over it.” Rafe responded, waving the gun around.

“Rafe…” Caeli trailed off, drawing the man’s attention back to her. She had to play a different angle. “Thank you for taking care of Cassius.” She whispered, just loud enough for Rafe to hear. His expression changed, it almost softened. She knew that if she played to his narcissism, thanked him for something he believed he should be thanked for, that he would do something for her in return. It was how he had always worked, especially when it came to Caeli.

“You’re welcome, the Order basically handed him over to me.” He responded, the information shocked Caeli but she kept that hidden. “Along with your file… I only read it after the auction, but I know everything now, about your powers and about what they did to you.” He told her next, her body was frozen as he leaned towards her ear. “Don’t underestimate me, Caeli.” He whispered before moving away. “Cassius, go and say hello to your parents,” Rafe stated next, Cassius didn’t budge.

“You told him…” Caeli trailed off.

“Yeah, didn’t keep his parentage secret, what would be the point of that?” Rafe asked, turning back to Cassius. “I said you can go to your parents.” He repeated, the teen took a few steps forward. The trust was broken, Caeli could tell. After he took a few steps and nothing happened, Cassius continued to walk over to his parents.

Caeli didn’t know what to say… what could she say to the son who was taken from her?

“I’m sorry,” Caeli said quietly, once Cassius stopped in front of her, Sam came and stood next to her, a pillar of normality in the turbulent storm of chaos around them. “I'm so sorry…” She repeated, not wanting to move towards him in case she scared him.

“It’s not your fault… Rafe’s been telling me that for years, I believe him. It was the Order that took me from you, you didn’t have a choice.” The boy responded in the same tone as Caeli spoke. With the close distance between them Caeli could see that he wasn’t lying, he truly believed what he was saying. His grey eyes held a clarity, a truth in them… this boy didn’t lie, at least not often. Caeli was almost proud.

“The whole time you knew…” Sam trailed off, Cassius looked to his father, his hands in his pockets.

“Yeah, Rafe said not to say anything… so I didn’t.” Cassius responded, seeming unable to hold eye contact with either of his parents.

“That was stupid on Rafe’s part, breaking that bond…” Sam whispered, turning towards Caeli.

“Well, Rafe was always intelligent but he was never really smart,” Caeli whispered back, smiling a little at her joke while Sam did the same.

“You can catch up on the way, now let’s move,” Rafe stated, and Caeli held onto Sam’s hand, the first time she had done so in a while.

“We’re going to be okay-”

“But Nate…”

_Nathan is okay._

The voice returned, she looked at the ground and saw the shadow that had led her to the brother earlier that day. She nodded her thanks.

“He’s okay,” Caeli whispered, making sure she had Sam’s eyes on her own. He furrowed his brow in confusion, but accepted her statement none-the-less, following Caeli’s lead as she headed to the front of the small group and began the trek to New Devon.

***

Cassius barely spoke the entire way to New Devon, then again, neither did Caeli or Sam. They only spoke when spoken to, when asked questions, when figuring out which would be the best path to take, which destroyed mansions were worth looking in. Something was pulling her towards the mansion closest to Avery’s, she walked towards it, feeling…

“Caeli!” Rafe shouted as she didn’t even notice that she was at the door. It was Tew’s mansion, she was sure of it.

“I need to go in here. I'm asking for five minutes to have a look-”

“Caeli, we don’t have time for your bullshit right now,” Rafe responded.

“If she feels that she has to go in there, Rafe, there’s probably some very important information in there that could help us. Caeli’s instincts are never wrong, you would know that.” Sam argued, Rafe rolled his eyes and sighed, gesturing towards the door and nodding.

“Fine. Five minutes and then we move, if you’re not back I'm sure you could guess as to what will happen.” The mercenaries pointed their guns at Sam and Cassius as Rafe finished speaking, she nodded before breaking through the doors and beginning to run around, following where her gut was telling her to go.

“Holy shit…” She trailed off when she found the room that had been calling to her. It was the dining room, a long table inside… with skeletons sitting in all but two of the seats. “What the hell happened…” She whispered, looking closer at the table and finding sigils on placement cards. That was when she realised the corpses were the founding captains of Libertalia.

She went to the two empty seats, realising she didn’t have much time left and saw that the placement cards had Tew and Avery’s sigils on them. She looked at the goblets that were held in a few of the corpse's hands… poisoning.

_Avery. Avery killed us._

The voices returned, and she could see shadows moving around the room. It was the captains that were talking to her. It was them who had been whispering to her at the treasury…

“Avery betrayed you all.” She whispered as the shadows sat on the skeletons. “This is worse than I thought…” She trailed off. “Thank you.” She whispered to the spirits, as soon as she did they all disappeared. They were finally at peace. But she wasn’t. She ran back to the front door, out of breath as Rafe looked back at his watch.

“You had ten seconds left, cutting it a bit fine don’t you think?” Rafe asked.

“No. I found something. The bodies of most of the founding captains of Libertalia, there were two missing, Tew and Avery. The rest were poisoned, Avery and Tew took all of the treasure for themselves.” She explained, Rafe turned to the mercenaries and signalled for them to put their guns down.

“Great, anything of actual use?” Rafe asked next.

“Well, I just found out why this whole section of Libertalia is flooded. It would have all been planned by Avery when it was built, his mansion would be up there-” she pointed to the higher ground where they would be headed next “-so that if the other captains betrayed him then he could blow the dam and take out all of their homes, kill them if he had to, which he did. The damn blew and he had all of them poisoned aside his right-hand man.” She explained.

“Tew,” Sam stated, walking towards Caeli. “Did they talk to you?” He asked next, Rafe cut in at that question.

“Did who talk to you?”

“The captains, Rafe. If you’ve read my file you would it’s not shadows I control, the Order always knew that. It’s spirits, they can talk to me.” She stated, and she then turned to Sam. “And yes they did, they didn’t say much, just confirmed that it was Avery. I found it strange that they didn’t mention Tew, especially if he was the right-hand man in all of this.” She stated.

“Maybe we don’t have the whole story yet, Tew might have betrayed Avery in the end.” Sam theorised and Caeli nodded.

“That is true.” She agreed, and with one look from Rafe, they were back on the path to reaching Avery’s front door. Cassius watched everything carefully, observing every interaction around him, Caeli noticed.

Once they were through Avery’s door and Shoreline were beginning to barricade it behind them they had a short wait, so Caeli turned to her son.

“You’re very observant… I can tell you’re listening to everything going on around you, watching everyone and everything.” She whispered, he looked at her, finally meeting her eyes.

“You think the Order put me in an orphanage, don’t you?” He asked and she was unsure of how to respond.

“I hoped they had, I guess deep down I knew they wouldn’t have. I thought they would kill you, in all honesty, I hoped they didn’t try and do to you what they had done with me. Raise you as a killer… but I guess I gave them the opportunity for a take two. No one outside of the Order knew of your existence, knew that you were even a possibility except for Rafe. I never told Sam I was pregnant, I only told Rafe because he was trying to get me to be with him… I guess that’s probably why the Order gave you to him. I assume that only happened after I broke free of them.” She stated, the trek to New Devon had been a long one, it had given her plenty of time to think about Cassius, about why the Order would have handed him to Rafe.

“Yeah…” He trailed off, looking to the ground. “I was in the same compound as you, kept there. We walked past each other once, you weren’t even aware of your surroundings, you were catatonic… they thought I wouldn’t realise who you were but I’ve never met anyone else with grey eyes like mine except for the woman I walked past in the hallway one time. They never showed me pictures of you, of Sam… I had no idea what you looked like until you broke out. They were scared you would come back, destroy them, so they took me out of the compound and gave me to Rafe, told him who I was, said I could be used against you. So he took me in, I trusted him, I really did… at least until today.” He explained, Caeli didn’t know how to respond.

“All I wanted for you was a normal life… I hoped to God that you were in an orphanage, that’s why I didn’t look for you. I should have, I should have looked. I would have found Rafe, I would have found and I would have found you all at once. I don’t know why I didn’t.” She said after a moment of thought.

“Sam… when he found out you were alive, he was… devastated, it meant that you hadn’t looked for him. But then he found out about the Order, and then when we took him to see you… he was going to go to you, but he said that as soon as he saw you pull the necklace out of your shirt that he couldn’t. He didn’t want you feeling guilty about it all. He knew that you genuinely thought he was dead. I was also angry because you hadn’t looked for me, but as soon as he told me that, told me about the ring and what it meant… I realised there would be a reason as to why you hadn’t looked for me. So I forgave you because of… because of Dad.” Cassius stated, he seemed to be testing out the last word on his tongue, seeing if it felt right. There were two whole years of calling Sam by his name, it must have been strange to be allowed to call him by something else.

“Mm…” Was all Caeli could reply with, pulling on the chain that hung around her neck, the ring still with her as it always was. It was either around her neck or in a safe place, she almost wished she had left it back at the hotel room. “Your father and I… we…” Caeli didn’t know what she was trying to say, she looked to Sam who was across the room and quickly tucked the necklace back into her shirt.

“You never stopped loving each other.” The teenaged boy said next, stating a clear observation.

“I never stopped loving you either.” She added. “If you were raised like me… emotions are hard for you to understand and feel. It’s better to numb it all.” She stated, the boy nodded. “I was shocked when I realised what I felt for Sam because of that, I didn’t know what it was for a while. When we first met I almost killed him, I was close to, and then we started working together… three years into the partnership he admitted his feelings for me and I didn’t know how to handle them. He made me realise that caring for other people isn’t a weakness, it’s a strength. You have a bond and a trust that cannot be broken by anything. Family is the most important thing in this world, whether it is blood or one that you choose for yourself. That is why, even after fifteen years of separation, I still care for him even though I thought he was dead, why I care for you even though I thought I would never see you again. You are my family, and anyone who has gone up against me knows that my family is what drives me.” She explained to him, he nodded slowly, not seeming to understand entirely but trying to.

“The Order experimented on me too, I don’t have powers as you do, but I have strength, and superior speed and agility. Rafe can use you against me as much as he can use me against you. If we get a chance, we should try and break free. You and me and Sam have a chance at taking them out-”

“No. We don’t.” Caeli cut him off, looking around the room to make sure no one heard what had been said. “We aren’t risking our lives to break free, Nathan is on his way, your uncle. Only after we are sure that he is close and he can help us and he has an escape plan will we try. I'm not losing you or your father, not again.”

“Let’s move.” Rafe’s voice echoed throughout the entrance hall of the mansion, and Caeli and Sam began leading the way again, trying to find any clues as to where Avery would have gone next.


	19. Cassius Morgan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we see things from Cassius' point of view...

Cassius watched as each person flooded into Avery’s study, he was still shocked that his mother wouldn’t risk a fight to get them out without his uncle. What use would he be? Another normal person like his father? But he couldn’t argue with her, she had said that she didn’t want to lose him or his father again… she looked haunted by the past, by what she had gone through, and he didn’t blame her. He didn’t want to lose them either.

He watched as Sam walked around the study, trying to find something to push them forward, his eyes flicking to look back at Cassius once every so often. He no longer had to keep the secret from Sam, he was grateful for that, two years he had worked with his own father, unable to tell him who he really was.

It killed him inside.

He knew that Sam had always been somewhat protective over him, probably due to overhearing a conversation between Rafe and Nadine which explained why Cassius was present through everything. That Cassius was something to be used against Caeli when she inevitably became a part of the hunt for Avery’s treasure again.

Cassius had never felt dissociated from his parents, he had always felt strangely close to them. Rafe had told him everything about his parents, never shifting blame onto them, just giving the truth about the situation. Although Cassius knew that was just because of how Rafe felt about his mother, he was still grateful for it. He held no hatred for them, no discontent. The Order had raised him to mature quickly, to understand everything about everyone and see things from an unbiased point of view, without feelings skewing his opinions and thoughts. He guessed he was grateful for that as well, he knew it was to make him a more efficient killer but it had ended up being the reason he forgave his parents.

Caeli was never too far from him, although she never seemed to get too close either. She was afraid, afraid that he would be ripped away from her again. Or that he may reject her. She was also tormented by something else, the way she closed her eyes made it look as if she was trying to block something out… voices? Maybe there were spirits here that were trying to talk to her as well.

“There has to be a passage out of this room,” Samuel stated, looking to Rafe.

“Great, but where?” Nadine asked since she was beginning to get impatient with everything. She had a short temper, and from experience, Cassius knew that when things began taking too long she could snap.

“We just need to find the switch,” Caeli stated, her voice gentle as she touched the end of an armour-sets spear. To the untrained eye, she was looking for the switch, but to Cassius, he saw that she was pricking her finger, she knew what the switch was and wanted to leave evidence behind for his uncle, Nathan, to find. She and Sam walked around the desk in a circular section of the study, acting like they were trying to find different switches until Caeli stood next to the globe. She spun it around and touched something.

She would have left blood on that globe, to show where to push the switch to open the staircase.

The ground began moving and created a set of stairs which descended underneath the ground of the mansion. Sam and Caeli would need to leave another clue… he noticed his father pull something out of his pocket and drop it on the ground. None of the mercenaries would notice it, they were all too focused on finding the treasure to notice something like a lighter being left on the ground.

“I pressed on Libertalia on the globe map. We should get moving.” Caeli explained what she had done and they all descended down the stairs, once again following her and Sam they had to go through a gate and eventually came to the first trap in the cave. It was a tiled floor, and with a little bit of investigation on Caeli’s part, she came to a conclusion.

“There is one safe path, judging from the missing floor pieces and the spikes underneath I guess it’s to kill anyone who doesn’t know the path their taking.” She stated, getting down on the ground to look underneath the floor tiles. “There are bombs underneath some of them, I'm guessing they’re kind of like mines. Step on the wrong one and boom, a nice explosion that will take out the tile beneath you and will you send you down onto the death spikes like that poor fellow.” She explained, pointing to a body which was impaled.

“How do we get across then?” Rafe asked, also becoming impatient with how long it was taking to find the treasure.

“I think I know the path,” Sam stated, holding the torch he was given up higher so he could see the sigils marked on the pillars which held up the tiles. “Follow me, very carefully and slowly.” He instructed, and so they did, only stepping on the tiles that Sam stepped on and making it across safely. There was another cavern in the tunnel with one doorway which they went through, setting off an explosion in the doorway to keep Nathan from following them any further.

“Oh my God…” Cassius heard his mother whisper once she made it into another cavern, once he did too he could see why she was frozen in shock. Hanging from the ceiling were bundles of bones… forearms and hands to be exact. Human. Cassius moved across the room first, seeing a sign written, he supposed by Avery, with some almost horrific words.

“The hands that stole from me.” He read out loud, and the premise of the line made him feel sick to the stomach. The bones hanging from the ceiling were real, they had all been cut off of their bodies by Avery. He massacred them all and then cut them into pieces for some sick warning.

“Avery really had lost his mind,” Sam stated, Caeli turned to look at Rafe.

“I'm getting a bad feeling, Rafe.” She stated simply, and even though Rafe had been around Cassius for years he had never seen the man so uncomfortable.

“Pretty sure we all are, Caeli, I think that’s the point.” The man responded, and they continued walking through the tunnels before they came across what looked to be mummies on the walls. “The hell is this?” Rafe asked as he was the first one through this time, Caeli got close to one.

“They’re explosive, we’re lucky we have modern torches. Fire ones would set these off, even with distance. We should walk through here in single file, just to be safe.” Caeli stated and Rafe led the way with Caeli close behind. They eventually came to another cavern filled with decomposed body parts, this time it was entire ribcages that hung from the ceiling.

“The hearts that hardened against me.” Cassius read out the sign, the sick feeling in his stomach increasing. They kept walking along the tunnels and eventually made it back outside where Cassius felt like he was able to breathe again.

They found themselves in a ship graveyard and Cassius found himself with an opportunity.

He was close to a mercenary who had his guard down, he didn’t know how dangerous Cassius was and it was clear that he didn’t think the boy could do any damage. He looked to Caeli and Sam who were arguing over something…

He needed his parents safe and away from everything…

He moved quickly, jabbing the mercenary in the throat and taking the gun he held, a semi-auto rifle, he shot the man in the head before turning around and beginning to shoot at other mercenaries. His parents turned around to see what the gunfire was about, his father looked almost proud while Caeli had a look of pure fear on her face. It disappeared quickly, replaced with a cold and calculating expression.

Cassius continued shooting at people, taking out those who had helped hold him captive as Caeli took out mercenaries with a knife which he guessed had been stashed in her boot. She got a gun for herself and for Sam, and the three began running from the mercenaries and into the graveyard.

“A handgun?! Really?!” His father shouted as they kept running, Cassius could hear gunfire in the distance… he assumed that was his uncle coming for them.

“I’m sorry that’s all I could grab for you!” His mother shouted back, using her rifle to take down a few more mercenaries. “Maybe you could grab your own bloody gun next time! Why is it my responsibility to make sure you’re armed?!” She added and it was becoming clear to Cassius that this kind of banter was normal between his parents.

“Because you're the trained assassin!” Was the response given, and Cassius watched as his mother rolled her eyes.

“You’re the one who always gets us into these messes!”

“And you’re the one who gets us out! I thought we already knew this!” Sam shouted.

“Don’t give me that shit, Samuel!” Caeli finished it off, Cassius noticed that Rafe and Nadine were no longer near them… they were probably more focused on finding the treasure, took a handful of people with them and delegated the rest to take down Cassius and his parents. There was a break in the mercenaries, so they ran as far as they could before they were stuck on a ship, pinned by a group of mercenaries.

Cassius ran out of ammo first, Caeli was second.

“We need someone behind!” Cassius shouted as they ducked behind the cover of some boxes on the ship’s deck as bullets never seemed to stop raining on them. Caeli looked to him, nodding slowly before her eyes turned pitch black and her body disappeared. He watched as a shadow moved across the sand that the mercenaries were standing on.

“You know, kid…” Sam trailed off, ducking for cover for a moment, looking Cassius in the eyes.

“What?” He asked, wondering what the man would say to him in the middle of a gunfight.

“Even though I didn’t know you were my son… I kind of thought of you as one anyway.” He told Cassius, who didn’t know how to respond.

“I'm sorry I didn’t tell you,” Cassius replied, but his father shook his head.

“That’s on Rafe, not you,” Sam responded, standing up and shooting at a few of the mercenaries. “I think you might be a better shot than I am…” He added, handing the gun over to Cassius who took in the weight of it and held it in two hands for accuracy.

“I'm not going to say that you’re wrong…” Cassius said with a smirk before standing up and shooting three mercenaries through the skull in one shot.

“Just like you're mother,” Sam said once Cassius dropped to hide behind the box again.

“Probably because we’re trained by the same people,” Cassius replied, hearing something. “There are shots coming from the back.”

“Sam!” He heard a voice shout over the mess of the fight.

“Nathan!” Sam shouted back, obviously recognising the voice as his brother.

“Stay put! We’re coming to you!” The same voice shouted, so Cassius stood up again, shooting at a few more of the mercenaries and seeing his mother also working her way from the back of the fight towards him again. With each time he stood up he saw the man that was knocked over the cliff a few hours ago and a blonde woman doing the same as his mother, making their way towards Cassius and Sam while taking down as many mercenaries as they could.

When the gunfire suddenly stopped, Cassius stood up again and saw his mother and the other two people running towards the ship.

“Hey! Up here!” Sam shouted, mostly for Nathan and the other woman, his mother had already shadowed onto the deck and was standing next to Cassius.

“Don’t do that again, ever, do you understand?” She asked and told him, he furrowed his eyebrows.

“I don’t see what the problem is, we got out, we’re all okay-”

“We are facing an army, Cassius. There are more mercenaries. You’re lucky that Elena came with Sully, which means we have an escape route. We just have to get to the plane.” His mother stated, although she was angry on the outside he could see that she was somewhat relieved. Relieved to be away from Rafe.

In the time that it took for Caeli to scold Cassius, Sam had let down a rope ladder for Nate and the other woman to climb up.

“You must be Cassius.” The woman walked over to him, holding out a hand. “I guess I'm your Aunt Elena.” Cassius shook her hand, just before a bomb hit the ship and took out the deck below them.

“I said there’d be more!” Caeli shouted, looking back at Cassius with worry clear in her eyes.

“We’re sitting ducks here!” Nathan shouted the obvious, Cassius took cover behind a wall and shot towards the mercenary with the RPG, killing him with the first bullet. He watched as Caeli handed Sam a new handgun and they continued on their way through the ship graveyard.

The faced two heavy artillery trucks before they were separated for a moment, a ship they were on being shot down. He had never been the best swimmer, and once he hit the water he ended up falling behind.

So much so that he ended up being surrounded by mercenaries with only three bullets left…

He did what any logical person would have done and surrendered. Rafe wouldn't hurt him without cause.


	20. The Decision

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which events lead to Sam making what could be viewed as a bad decision...

“Hey…” Sam said as they finally caught up with Nate and Sully. Elena had been with him and Caeli, Cassius… well, they assumed he had been with Nate or was making his own way forward. He seemed capable of taking care of himself.

“Hey,” Nate replied before looking to Sam’s arm, where he had taken the bullet that was intended for his brother. “How’s that?”

“Oh.” Sam laughed. “Bullet grazed my shoulder.” He explained, even though it had felt a lot more painful than just a graze.

“Yeah…” Nate trailed off.

“You?” Sam asked, talking about the cut on Nate’s head.

“Cliffside grazed my face,” Nate responded, Sam noticed Caeli looking around the area they were standing in. “So, how’d you lose Rafe?”

“Cassius… he grabbed a gun, started shooting. It was enough of a distraction to lure some of them into one of Avery’s traps, Rafe and Nadine must have focused on going to the treasure. Figured an army of mercenaries would take us out.” Sam explained, hearing Caeli’s breath beginning to quicken.

“Hey, look, about the whole Alcazar thing…”

“Hey just… we can save that for later, okay?” Nate cut him off, and Sam couldn’t agree more with the delay of the conversation that would need to be had. “Which way?”

“On the beach, the other side of this town,” Sully responded, Sam didn’t like where this was going.

“Okay…” Nate whispered in reply.

“Good, I hope all that ruckus didn’t attract any attention,” Elena stated next, to which Nate sighed.

“Yeah, let’s hope so.”

“Woah, woah, woah. Sorry, what are we doing?” Sam cut into the conversation.

“What do you think we’re doing? We’re getting the hell off of this rock,” Sully replied. As if it was the obvious choice.

“Right, we could do that… or we could head in that direction which is a shortcut,” Sam replied, they needed that treasure… and he knew where it was and how to get to it. Why wouldn’t they take the chance?

“Shortcut to what?” Sullivan asked.

“To Avery’s treasure.” He answered, much to the disgust of everyone else that was there. “I mean, Rafe’s got to go all the way around but we could just-”

“Hey, screw Rafe,” Sullivan cut him off.

“Hey, Victor, with all due respect maybe just-”

“You just don’t know when to quit, do you?” The older man cut him off again.

“Look, we’re all here for the same reason, right?” Sam asked next, looking to Caeli who was still looking around the area, seeming to become worried and panicked.

“We didn’t come after the treasure, we came after you,” Elena replied.

“And I appreciate that I do. But we’re good and we’ve got the lead for now. We can do this.” Sam tried to convince them, although it didn’t seem to be working. “Nathan, c’mon. Huh, look around. Okay, Aver scuttled every last ship on this island. You know why?”

“Because he was hell-bent on keeping his treasure,” Elena answered, she wasn’t wrong.

“Exactly,” Sam replied.

“No matter the cost to the other people around him.” She added, now she was wrong.

“Because he didn’t want anyone to follow him.” Sam corrected her, stepping towards Nate. “Because he was leaving. Look at this.” Sam showed a note he had picked up on the way to Nate. “Okay. I found _his_ map of the island, okay?” Nate took the piece of paper from him and looked at it carefully. “That’s his ship right under that mountain.” Sam pointed to the mountain that was so close it would take less than an hour to reach it. “That’s where our treasure is and it is exactly where Rafe is heading now while we stand around here and argue like idiots.”

“Okay, what if he’s already left the island and his ship sunk somewhere out in the middle of the ocean?” Sullivan asked.

“Then we find out where it got sunk,” Sam replied, looking back to Nate.

“Oh boy.” He heard Sullivan say under his breath, but his focus was back on his brother.

“How long we been chasing this thing, huh? You and me and Caeli. No offence to these guys, but they don’t get it.” Sam stated, hoping his words would be enough to convince Nate to search for this treasure. To at least go to the mountain.

“Actually, Sam, they do. They really do.” Nate replied, pushing the map back onto Sam’s chest.

“Okay,” Sam whispered, realising he wouldn’t be winning this argument.

“Trust me, they’ve seen this… kind of obsession before. But Sam, we’re not those kids anymore. We’re not, and we’ve got nothing to prove.” Nate told him, so Sam backed off.

“Victor, where did you say that plane was?” Sam asked, tucking the map back into his pocket.

“Right this way,” Sullivan stated with a gentle voice, leading the way back to the seaplane. They all moved to follow… except for Caeli.

“Caeli, are you okay?” Sam asked, noticing that her body was shaking. She was panicking.

“Where is he?” she asked, looking to Nate. “Where’s Cassius?” she pushed the question to Nathan.

“Shit,” Sam swore, angry with himself for not realising the kid wasn’t with them sooner. Obsession. He was obsessed with this bloody treasure, so much so he was losing focus on what was around him.

“I don’t know, last I saw him we were on that ship that sunk-”

“He fell into the water with you, he got stuck on the ship with you. Where is he?!” She shouted.

“Caeli…” Sam said her name carefully, walking towards her as darkness surrounded her hands. “Hey. He’s just like you, he’s probably fine.” He tried to make her feel better but it didn’t work, to say the least.

“There was a group of mercenaries behind us, they must have grabbed him. They would have taken him to Rafe, I have to-”

“It’s not safe,” Nate stated simply, cutting Caeli off as tears began to fill her eyes. “You can’t go after him, you’re good Caeli, but you can’t take on an army by yourself. We barely made it out of that alive. Rafe wouldn’t kill Cassius, not without reason. Cassius can still be sued against you, is one of the few things that can be used against you, he won’t throw that away carelessly.” He added. Sam, held Caeli’s hands to steady them, the darkness that had surrounded them didn’t disappear, it just encased his hands too. “We can get Cassius when Rafe isn’t surrounded by Shoreline. When he’s back home after all of this is done.”

“Nate’s right,” Sam stated, even though he didn’t fully agree.

“Come on, we aren’t going to abandon him if that’s what you’re feeling, Caeli,” Nate added, she looked to the brother. “We’re just trying to keep ourselves alive so that we can save him when a better opportunity arises.”

“We’re no use to him dead,” Sam stated, and that line seemed to be enough to snap Caeli back into the situation at hand. She nodded.

“We’re no use to him dead.” She repeated the words, the shadows around their hands disappearing as her face became passive.

“Hey…” Sam let go of her hands to hold her face carefully, all emotion had flooded from her expression. She was compartmentalising, he had watched her do it many times before, to this extent it was only when he or Nate had been in a grave amount of danger and she was the only one who could get them out of it. She shut down her emotions, turned into the cold, calculated killer that she was raised to be. “Don’t shut down on me.” He stated, her eyes filled with pain again at his words. He had said that once to her, a long time ago, when she had shut everything out, shut her human side down to become just a weapon. But they didn’t need that from her now.

“What else can I do?” She asked quietly. “We’re abandoning him.”

“We aren’t abandoning him. He was taken from us, again. We don’t need ‘Assassin Caeli’, we just need ‘Caeli’.” He told her, she nodded once again and put her hands on top of his, still holding her face in a steadying way. Her eyes closed for a moment and she took a deep breath, he kissed her forehead before letting her go. She would be okay, for now.

“Not to interrupt the moment here…” Sullivan started, pausing as Caeli looked towards him. “Who the hell is Cassius?” Caeli grimaced and looked to the ground, she was about to respond but Sam did it for her.

“Our son.” He told the man, the man who had set them up from the beginning with the bloody Romanoff music box. Sam should probably thank him for that at some point.

“Right. Well, Nate’s right, Sam’s right. It’s best that we get away, make a plan and go back for him later with more guns, more people.” Sullivan stated, to which Caeli nodded.

“Yeah… I guess so.” She agreed half-heartedly, they then began working their way through the port town before coming across something that seemed similar to a Skyrail, the problem was there were no controls for it and the only idea they had so far was for Nate to get down onto a different platform and pull the Skyrail across with his rope. Next problem was getting him down to the platform.

“I think I’ve got an idea, Nate, give me a hand,” Sam stated, they pushed a large wooden plank so it was hanging over the ledge, with Sam and Sullivan’s weight holding one end, Nate was able to jump off of the other and reach the other platform. The rest of them climbed onto the sky rail, waiting for Nate to pull them across.

It swung at the end of the rope the Skyrail was hanging from. Caeli, Elena and Sullivan all jumped across to the other side in time, Sam didn’t make it. Although that wasn’t a problem as it was helpful for Nate and his ascent back up. Once Nate made it to the Skyrail the brothers were about to jump to get to the other side with the others, but the Skyrail platform broke, and they were suddenly hanging on for their lives.

They climbed to the top of the platform, Nate jumped to the side with the others, the momentum from that jump sent the platform swinging the other way where Sam found a different section of ground to land on… it gave him an opportunity.

He looked back at the other four, although his focus was on Caeli. She looked truly exhausted and defeated, her eyes had dark circles around them, and she still looked distressed about having to leave their son behind.

“Sam!” Nate shouted across to his brother. The gap between where he was and where he needed to be was jumpable, but…

“Sam, c’mon! Jump, I’ll catch you!” Nate shouted and just as he was about to jump he noticed Caeli once again. She was out of it, staring blankly at the broken platform, unaware that he was safe and separated from them. He couldn’t let her live like that, even if it wasn’t forever. Her heart was shattered, and it was showing far too much. It was affecting her far too much. He saw Nate look to Caeli as well, shaking his head as he turned to look back at Sam.

“No…” Nate started, Sam looked behind himself to the mountain where Rafe was heading, where both Cassius and the treasure would be. “No, no, don’t you even think about it, you hear me?” Nate warned, but Sam had already made up his mind.

“I'm sorry I got you into this… all of you,” Sam stated, finally Caeli’s eyes made it from the platform to him. The pain in her eyes…

“Sam…” She said his name in a tone so shattered it finalised his decision.

“Hey, all of that doesn’t matter anymore okay, let’s just-”

“Look at her, Nate,” Sam said simply, gesturing to Caeli who seemed to be unable to speak. “I can’t leave him behind, not if it’s going to hurt her that much,” Sam stated, Caeli furrowed her brow at him.

“Sam, I swear to god…” She trailed off, but it was too late.

“I’ve got to see this thing through.” Sam finished, looking to Caeli who was shaking her head.

“Hey listen to me, if you do this I'm not coming after you!” Nate shouted, but Sam didn’t care. He would run that risk. “You hear me?!” Sam froze for a moment and gave them one last look.

“I’m sorry.” He said before running off. He had to get to that mountain before Rafe did, he had to get ready to get Cassius out.

He had to.

 


	21. Panama

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we witness the night that set off the chain of events leading to right now...

_Caeli looked at the pregnancy test, the third one she had taken that evening. Positive. Just like the other two. She was tempted to try a fourth one, just in hopes, it could give her any kind of reason to believe that there was a chance she wasn’t pregnant… but there was too much telling her that she was._

_Aside from the pregnancy tests, her period still had yet to come, she had been feeling nauseous for two weeks and had been exceptionally short-tempered lately._

_So she sat on the toilet with the lid down, staring at the test as Sam was out finalising the plan with Nate and Rafe about going into Panama prison to get access to the old and half-destroyed section of the prison, where they would hopefully find a clue as to where Avery’s treasure would be located._

_Caeli closed her eyes, anxiety kicking in as her foot began to tap on the tiled floor. A baby… she couldn’t have a baby in this environment, while they were living this kind of life. She put the tests in the bin, covering them with some paper and then looked in the mirror._

_Maybe… maybe she could convince Sam to give everything up._

_Fourth times the charm, right?_

_She pulled on the chain that hung around her neck, beginning to play with the wedding band like she did when she was nervous or anxious or stressed. Right now she was all three. She just had to tell him, just had to say that she was pregnant. That should be enough to convince him..._

_She wasn’t entirely sure._

_The last few times she had tried to convince him to live a normal life with her hadn’t ended well, to say the least. They didn’t argue often, but when they did it seemed to be a clash of two mighty personalities with equal levels of stubbornness. Arguments were usually unresolved until the next day when they had slept and found a new and less offensive way to speak to each other._

_She managed to overthink the entire situation, a little more than usual, and by the time that Samuel arrived back in their room, she was already worked up._

_“You alright?” He asked her as soon as he walked through the door, she was sitting on the end of the bed and staring at her hands._

_“Um…” She trailed off._

_“This isn’t about our plan again, is it?” He asked her next, she stood up._

_“Your stupid plan.” She corrected him, this was something they had already argued about in the past week, but she didn’t want to go down that path again f she could avoid it._

_“So it is, then.” He responded, she sighed and shook her head._

_“No, it’s…” She trailed off, pausing._ “ _Samuel, this ridiculous hunt for treasure, it's not worth losing your life over, you are going to get yourself killed,_ ” _Caeli added, although it wasn’t where she had intended to go with the conversation it’s where it had ended up. As per usual, she had no control over herself once her emotions came into play. She was scared, she didn’t want to lose him._

_“We aren’t going to die, Caeli. We can survive without you protecting us for a few days-”_

_“You are going into a prison notoriously known for abusing it’s inmates and has a high rate of inmate deaths. Just because you’ve paid the warden to let you in and let you back out again doesn’t mean that something won’t happen to you in there, and I won’t be able to help you if it goes wrong.” She tried to reason with him but he wasn’t listening._

_“Caeli, this is my life’s work, getting to this point, to find a clue that could take us straight to Avery’s treasure. Not only that, this was something that Mum was working on. I feel like I have to follow this through, if not for me and Nate then for her.” He replied, it wasn’t too heated yet, she was grateful for that._

_“I want you two to be safe, Rafe can’t be trusted and we both know that.” She added._

_“We don’t trust him Caeli, we just have to act like we do. He’s trying to prove something to his parents, that he’s more than what their money made him. We need his money to find this treasure.” Sam stated as he had already done previously._

_“But I need you...” Caeli whispered and she didn’t know what she thought was going to happen after she said those four words. She didn’t expect what came._

_“And I need you to trust me for once.” Sam snapped back, it caught Caeli off guard how quickly he turned to anger, it wasn’t normal for him to do so._

_“I do trust you-"_

_“You’ve gone and done these kinds of things before, entering places by yourself because it was the best plan, and I’ve trusted that you would make it out. I trust your capabilities, that you can face whatever you come up against and win. You don’t trust me to do the same.” Sam stated and Caeli furrowed her brow in confusion. Where the hell was this coming from?_

_“I do trust you, I trust Nate. I don’t trust_ Rafe _to make the right decisions in there. I don’t trust the guards. I don’t trust the inmates. I have never gone into a prison by myself where there are so many variables that making a plan is a waste of time like it is now with this prison. You need to be in there with people you can trust with your life, that you trust to do the right thing, that you trust to make the right decisions to keep all of you alive no matter the cost. Rafe won’t do that. He will make the best decision for himself and his money and it’s going to get you killed.” Caeli stated, and although she was doing her best to not raise her voice, it sometimes felt that was the only way to get him to listen to her._

 _“Caeli, could you please just trust a plan that you_ haven’t _made for once? Everything is going to be fine-"_

_“This isn’t about me not making the plan, this isn’t about me at all right now, Samuel. My gut is telling me that this is going to end badly and I’ve never been wrong before.” She told him, he didn’t retort straight away so she kept going. “This is me being worried about your safety, Sam. This isn’t me not trusting you, this is me going out of my mind with worry. If you die in there I don’t know what I’m going to do. I need you in my life, if you aren’t here then I won’t be able to cope. You are the only thing in this world that I honestly cannot live without, I will do anything to make sure I don’t lose you, even if you disagree with me-"_

_“This isn’t about losing me, this is about stopping me from finding this treasure. This is about you wanting to go back to America and live a normal life, I’m not an idiot.” Sam cut her off. “Why have you been so fascinated with the idea of a suburban lifestyle? Since when did you care about settling down and buying a house and getting a job? That isn’t us, Caeli, it never has been and it never will be.”_

_“How do we know that if we won’t bloody well try it? I just want you to be safe, want the both of us to be safe. Please, could you just think-"_

_“No, Caeli!” He shouted and it shocked her how loud he got so quickly._

_“No what?” She asked quietly._

_“I’m not going to think about that right now! I-" he cut himself off as he realised he was still yelling at her. “Look, I promise this is the last treasure before we try a normal life, okay? I just need to find this one.”_

_“That’s what you said the last three times we talked about this, Sam,” Caeli stated, turning away from him for a moment to get herself back together._

_“What do you want me to do, Caeli?” He asked and so she turned back to face him._

_“I want you to stop lying to me. This won’t be the last one and if you survive prison, neither will the next.” She pulled out the ring from her shirt again, pulling it taught on the chain. “You said to me that even though we are bound to change you will always love me, no matter what happens. I’ve changed, Sam. We have changed. I need a normal life, if only temporary, and I need it now. For both of our sakes.”_

_“Caeli, if you think you need a domestic life then maybe we aren’t cut out for this anymore,” Sam told her, and even though the rest of what they had argued about had hurt her..._

_“What?” she asked, her tone showing her anger._

_“Maybe we’ve been at this together for too long,” Sam added, she was fuming now._

_“I tell you I need to settle down and you suddenly think we shouldn’t be together anymore?!” She yelled, not caring about keeping her voice down, not anymore. Sam looked at her with a passive look on his face. “I, honestly, cannot believe you! We have been together for eight years and you think it’s an absolute abomination for me to want to have a family with you?!”_

_“I never said that-"_

_“Oh, you made it perfectly clear.” Her volume dropped again as she thought over what she needed to do next. “You don’t want me around, I’m gone.” She told him, she grabbed her bag and began packing everything into it._

_“Caeli, what are you doing?” He asked, his voice too gentle for someone who had basically just said they shouldn’t be together anymore._

_“I thought you would fight for me like you always do, but if you think we aren’t cut out for each other anymore, then why bother.” She zipped the bag up and looked him in the eyes, he seemed shocked as she had tears present in them. The tears fell down her cheeks as she looked at him._

_She was cut to the core._

_“Caeli, I’m sorry I didn’t-”_

_“No, don’t apologise. You said exactly what you needed to say.” She was far too calm as tears continued rolling down her face. This was the first time he would have seen her cry... good. She took the necklace off and threw it on the bed, it hurt her to take the ring off as much as it hurt Sam to watch her do it._

_“Caeli, please-"_

_“I’m going to find somewhere else to sleep tonight. I’ll leave the ring here, if you come after me I’ll take it back, if not then keep it. If you don’t want to settle down, live a ‘domesticated' life with me, then stay here and get yourselves killed. I won’t be coming to save your asses, I promise you that.” She told him, putting the bag over her shoulder._

_He didn’t say anything to stop her from leaving, and it seemed that as soon as she was five steps from their room that Rafe was in front of her, firstly asking if she was alright before asking if she wanted to spend the night in his room. She knew the hidden meaning behind that. She declined and gave him reasons as to why the hell she wouldn’t be doing that and then walked out of the hotel._

_Being outside, in the fresher air, helped her feel like she could breathe again. All she wanted to do was turn back and go back to Sam, but she didn’t. She couldn’t._

_She began walking down the street, turning her phone off in case Sam started calling her and looked for a hotel near her. She spotted lights in the distance and so she started walking towards them._

_She suddenly felt a pinch in her neck, when she touched the spot she found a dart..._

_Her mind immediately began feeling hazy, and only once she had pulled out the dart and fallen to her knees did someone walk out from the alleyway she had carelessly walked past without checking._

_A few men surrounded her, but she only focused on the blonde woman. Katherine Marlowe._

_“No... please...” Caeli begged which triggered Katherine to smile at her._

_“Welcome back to the Order, Caeli. Welcome home.”_


	22. The Chase

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Caeli goes after Sam, with or without back up...

Caeli was barely aware of what was happening around her, she did know that Sam had just run off to get Cassius back... that was about all she was sure of at this point. And Nate had threatened to not go after him.

“He called your bluff,” Sully told Nate, he then walked over and touched Caeli’s shoulder. She was still staring at the empty place where Sam had been standing a few seconds ago. “Caeli…” He trailed off, she looked to him and seemed to come back to her senses. Sully had always been able to do that, probably because of the role he’d had in her life. He was almost like a father to her.

“I’ll shadow after him.” She stated, suddenly aware of what was going on. Sam had gone after Cassius and the treasure… without her.

“No,” Nate responded. “You aren’t running off too.” He was as worried as she was.

“We’re wasting time, you three should get to the plane and bring it closer to that mountain,” Caeli stated, just about to shadow after Sam when Nate spoke again.

“Caeli, for the love of God, you’re not going by yourself. We’re going together.” He told her, she looked him directly in the eyes.

“You convinced me to leave my son behind so we would have a better chance of getting him back later… I'm not asking you to leave your brother behind, I am asking for you to get the plane ready.” She stated, watching Nate’s form carefully as he walked towards. “We’re wasting time.”

“No, we’re going to find a way for all of us to go.” He finalised, beginning to walk away.

“Fine.” She snapped. “But if we take too long, I will be going and I will be going by myself. It’s my family, Nate.”

“He’s my brother-”

“He’s my husband.” She cut him off of whatever spiel he would be going onto.

“Since when were you two married?” Sully asked, Caeli pulled the ring out from her shirt, miraculously still there after the night before in the stormy sea.

“Vegas, all those years ago. We got married in a chapel there, slightly drunk to say the least.” She explained quickly. “My point is, Sam is my family, Cassius is my son. They are my responsibility, so if we end up wasting time trying to get all of us up high enough to go after Sam and either him or Cassius die because we were too late…” She couldn’t finish the sentence, although it was clear to the others what she intended to say. She would be holding them responsible.

“Five minutes, if we don’t find a way in five minutes then you can go, alright?” Nate bargained, she sighed.

“Fine. I'm counting from now.” She told him, and they began running to find something, anything, that could get them to the higher ground and on the path that Sam would have taken. They soon found a goods trailer, which when pushed up against a retaining wall was high enough to allow them to jump up. Nate put the brake on the trailer before they all stepped back.

“See, a way for all of us,” Nate said, looking to Caeli before she heard the brake snap. The four of them caught the trailer before it rolled away.

“This isn’t going to hold,” Sully stated the obvious, he and Elena were at the back of the trailer, holding a majority of the weight.

“C’mon…” Nate whispered as if he was talking to the trailer. “Caeli…”

“What?” She asked, on the opposite side to him. She couldn’t see his face to know what he was thinking.

“Caeli, go.” He told her.

“What happened to go together?” She asked next, focusing on keeping the trailer against the wall.

“Plans change…” Nate spoke quietly. “You’re right, it’s your family. Go and save them.” Nate told her, she closed her eyes for a second to fully understand what this meant for Nate. He was trusting her to do this alone, he realised that they could die… but that she was the best chance they had of all getting out of there alive.

She jumped onto the top of the trailer and ran to the wall, jumping on top of it and turning to look back just as the trailer began rolling back down the hill, the three others watching as it hit a statue of Avery and one of the wheels fell off. There was no chance of them using that again.

“Now how the hell are we supposed to get up there?” Sully asked and Caeli was looking around from her new vantage point. She now had the idea of them all going together in her mind… she didn’t want that to change now.

“We don’t have enough time,” Nate stated, looking to Elena. Caeli was already looking at the path she needed to follow.

“Caeli, not by yourself…” Sully stated as he saw her do so.

“I have to. The walls too high for me to catch one of you if you jump. We don’t have enough time to find another way, I have to go after him.” She told them bluntly, leaving no room for argument. “I said I would give you five minutes, that five minutes is up.” She added, looking at Nate.

“Caeli, if you die Sam will kill me,” Nate said like it would change her mind.

“If I die, he’s already dead,” Caeli responded, she knew how much it would hurt him to watch her run off too but she couldn’t wait. Not any longer.

“We’ll get the plane as close to the mountain as we can,” Elena stated, looking to Sully for backup on her statement. The man nodded.

“Be ready for a quick getaway,” Caeli told them.

“Is there any other kind?” Sully asked next and Caeli took one last look at the three of them. She could very well die within the next hour… that thought scared her. “Don’t even think about not coming back, kid.” He added, she smiled weakly at him.

“Thanks, Sully, for everything.” She said quietly, the man nodded at her.

“You don’t give yourself enough credit.” The man told her, she shook her head.

“I’ll see you on the plane, no sooner.” She finished, not waiting for a response before she began running after Sam. She followed a path in the forest, assuming it was the same way that Sam had gone and only finding evidence of that when she came across a set of footprints in the mud.

“Sam!” She shouted, hoping he was close enough to hear her. “God damn it, Sam.” She whispered to herself, a shadow appearing next to her. Cassandra… at least who she thought was Cassandra. She followed the spirit through dangerous jumps, rope-swinging and potential falls to death… she felt her body was too weak to shadow-walk.

“Still getting sick of this death-defying shit.” She whispered as she entered the mountain, still following the spirit as she faced even more dangerous jumps, rock-climbing and hoping that wooden structures wouldn’t fall out from underneath her. She finally caught sight of Avery’s ship in the central cavern of the mountain as she hung from a rope, a smile breaking on her face as she did so.

“Oh my god, that’s it.” She whispered to herself once again before she figured out where to head next. More dangerous rock-climbing… seems like the best plan.

Once she came to the end of the rock-climbing she saw what seemed to be her one way down somewhat safely. Mudslide. It probably ended in water… she took a deep breath and readied herself for it. She couldn’t worry about her fear right now… Cassius and Sam were relying on her. With that thought, her mind was set and she jumped.

Landing in the water was a shock to her, the water was bloody cold, but she kept focused on her breathing before she realised she would have to go underwater to get to the right cavern. After having to submerge twice in the water she rose underneath a wooden jetty, glad for the coverage once she heard voices.

“We almost done here?” Nadine asked and Caeli assumed she was talking to one of her men.

“This is the last of them, ma’am.” The mercenary replied Caeli had to stifle a laugh. _Ma’am_.

“Good.” The woman responded. “If we hurry we can catch up with the others,” Nadine added, Caeli then heard a boat leaving the jetty…

“Sam just stole our goddamn boat.” Rafe’s voice rang clear to Caeli’s ears, her temporary entertainment of Nadine being called ‘ma’am’ was immediately gone. Anger filled her veins instead. “He’s headed for Avery’s ship, come on.”

“Let him.” Caeli furrowed her brow as Nadine responded, she was going to let Sam go? “We’re done.”

“We’re done?” Rafe asked, and while Caeli was focusing on what was being said she was also listening for any kind of evidence that Cassius was with them.

“Most of my men are dead, Rafe. And those who aren’t have already left.” Nadine responded.

“Can you see that?” Caeli assumed that as Rafe was speaking he was pointing to the ship. “The end is literally in sight.”

“That maniac pirate of yours has rigged this entire cave. I'm not setting foot on his ship,” Nadine responded, Caeli took in what she had said. The cave was filled with traps… who knows what going onto his ship could trigger.

“Nadine, if you cut and run right now, the loss of all your men, everything that we’ve done, is for nothing.”

“We have millions in gold right here. I’d say that plus our lives in something.”

“No wonder so many of your men abandoned you.”

“Excuse me?”

“We’re on the verge of making history here, and you're okay with walking away with just a pittance- a fraction of what Sam is going to get from that boat.”

“Sam and Cassius.” Nadine corrected him, Caeli was suddenly re-interested in the conversation. Cassius must have gotten away, he was with Sam and they were both heading for the ship.

“You lost the kid too? You want them to win everything?”

“If they can walk away from that ship alive, they can have it,” Nadine responded, pausing for a moment. “Hell, I’d say they’ve earned it. God knows you didn’t.” Caeli smiled at Nadine’s words. Those words specifically would have made Rafe very angry and would probably lead to him being rather irrational. Caeli heard the sound of skin hitting skin and assumed that Rafe had just hit Nadine for her comment.

“Now look, we can stand here and insult each other all day or we can finish what it is that we-” He was cut off… not by words, but with the sound of effort from Nadine and the sound of a punch, she guessed it was her hitting back. She then heard a body hit the jetty.

“Oh, we’re finishing it all right.” Nadine was angry, and if she had any idea of what the woman was like at all, Caeli assumed she was pointing a gun at Rafe’s head. She then heard two guns being readied.

“Sorry, ma’am.” One of the mercenaries apologised… so there was two of them, and they had turned against Nadine. Caeli almost wanted to say ‘I told you so’.

“Yeah… the thing about mercenaries, Nadine, their loyalty… it’s bought. It’s not earned. Now, come on. Either we can finish this thing together, or we can just end it right here.” Rafe stated, confirming what Caeli had thought about the mercenaries turning on Nadine.

“Let’s go make history.” Caeli could hear the bitterness in Nadine’s words as she spoke before they all climbed onto the boat that was still there and went on their way to Avery’s ship. Once they were gone, Caeli found a way to get above the water and onto the jetty for a moment. She took a few deep, staggered breaths before jumping back into the water and beginning to swim to Avery’s ship.

When she was about halfway to the ship an explosion came from it, blowing a hole in the side which was also above water. She guessed that could be her way in.

As soon as she made it inside she saw one of the mercenaries dead, probably having set off the explosion in the first place. That meant there was only Nadine, Rafe and one other possible mercenary left.

This would be easier than she thought.


	23. A Thief's End Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Caeli finds Sam on Avery's ship, although they aren't alone...

“Sam!” Caeli shouted from the deck, before dropping through to below. As soon as she landed below deck she could see why this treasure was so well renowned. Every spare space on the ship was filled with precious metals, statues, everything of value.

“Well… there’s the treasure.” She whispered to herself before continuing through the ship, not wanting to touch anything in case it set off another bomb or something of the like. Once she made it to the other side she saw a trap door, it was the only place the would have gone…

So she opened it.

The room was filled with heavy smoke, but one it cleared a little she could see the treasure stacked in cells and hanging from the ceiling in rope nets.

“Sam?” She asked, hoping she would get any kind of response, she walked down the stairs as the smoke continued clearing from the room. The treasure was burning… “Sam?” She asked again, hoping for a response. Through the smoke, she saw a figure move, and so she pointed her gun directly at them. There was a good chance it was someone she was working against.

“Hey, Caeli.” It was Rafe, who was also pointing a gun right back at her. “Was expecting Nate to turn up in all honesty.”

“Unluckily for you, you’ve got me instead.” She replied. “Where is Sam?” She asked him, Rafe was holding his side as he coughed from the smoke. He was looking absolutely dishevelled.

“Oh, he’s right there,” Rafe replied, Sam was underneath a large and heavy-looking beam of wood.

“Sam?!” She yelled, but he didn’t move. “Where’s Cassius?” Caeli asked next, trying not to focus too much on the fact that Sam wasn’t moving.

“With Nadine I imagine, won’t be too far away. Sam and Cassius must have split up to search the ship quicker, hasn’t worked too well for them.” Rafe answered and Caeli kept her gun trained on Rafe as she slowly moved towards Sam.

“Sam.” She repeated his name, hoping for any kind of response.

“Relax, he’s alive,” Rafe told her. “Y’know this idiot nearly got us all killed.”

“That doesn’t surprise me, but I'm going to get him the hell out of here,” Caeli stated, still inching closer and closer to the unconscious man.

“No, you’re not,” Rafe said simply, walking to stand between her and Sam. His voice was far too calm… he truly was a psychopath.

“Rafe, you can have the treasure, all right? Just let me get Sam out of here.” Caeli managed to say before needing to cough from the smoke.

“After everything that he’s done? How noble of you, but no.” Rafe never seemed to understand family, what the Drakes meant to Caeli.

“We stay here any longer and we’re all dead. Is that what you want?” Caeli stated the obvious, coughing once again from the smoke.

“That’s not what I said… what do you think Nadine?” Rafe asked, the woman addressed was at the trap door entry to the room, a gun pointed at Caeli as he held Cassius against her body as a hostage. “Good to see you up and about. Be a dear and relieve Caeli there of her gun.”

“Hand it over.” Nadine’s voice rang clear to Caeli’s ears, she didn’t hesitate to drop the gun and kick it over to Nadine once the other woman turned the gun to Cassius’ head.

“You really think you can trust him?” Caeli asked, well aware that she had no chance to win against two armed people.

“That’s not your concern,” Nadine replied.

“I told you your men would turn against you, look where it’s got you,” Caeli added quietly as Nadine walked towards her, letting Cassius go.

“Now, what are you trying to instigate, Caeli? Nadine and I are partners, I don’t screw over my partners.”

“Really? Because your argument five minutes ago, buying her men out from under her isn’t screwing her over? Because shooting the guard that was on your side in Panama instead of giving him a cut wasn’t screwing the Drakes over?!” Caeli cut the man off, beginning to shout as Cassius stood next to her.

“Now, Caeli, you weren’t even there. If I remember correctly, you left… you abandoned us,” Rafe stated, Caeli shook her head.

“You know that’s not what happened,” Caeli stated, Rafe tilted his head to the side.

“Right from the start, you all took advantage of my generosity. You tried to cut me out, and it’s high time you learned-” Rafe was cut off as Nadine placed her gun against the back of his skull. Caeli would’ve liked to have thought that the manoeuvre would help them out, that Nadine had switched sides, but as her gut tightened she knew that wasn’t the case. “…what are you doing?” Rafe asked, his eyes still locked on Caeli’s.

“Now _you_ give me your gun,” Nadine instructed.

“Nadine…” Rafe was going to try and convince the woman to rethink the situation but stopped himself when he heard her take the safety off.

“I won’t ask you again,” Nadine stated, Caeli put her arm on Cassius’ shoulder and pushed him behind her body, Rafe still had a gun pointed at them, and she wouldn’t risk her son’s safety. Rafe sighed before he handed the gun over his shoulder to Nadine.

“You are being…” Nadine took a step away from Rafe. “..profoundly stupid right now,” Rafe told her, turning to face Nadine as she walked towards the exit.

“Look over there…” Nadine gestured to two skeletal bodies that Caeli hadn’t noticed earlier. It must be the bodies of Avery and Tew.

“Stop screwing around-” Rafe was cut off as Nadine shot a bullet through the floor near his feet. “Jesus!” Rafe shouted, Caeli once again made sure Cassius was safely behind her.

“I said look,” Nadine repeated her instruction from before, so Rafe did.

“Okay, it’s a couple of skeletons… so what?” Rafe stated and asked.

“It’s Tew and Avery, isn’t it?” Cassius whispered behind Caeli.

_It had to be done. To keep the treasure safe._

“I think so.” She replied after that voice echoed in her ears. It was a male voice, she knew from instinct that it was Avery’s.

_Avery was insane with power._

And there was Tew’s voice.

“I don’t know as much about history as you lot, but I've got a pretty good idea as to who those two are,” Nadine stated, beginning to walk back up the steps to get out of the burning room.

“Well, enlighten us,” Rafe said, Caeli rolled her eyes.

“Are _you_ profoundly stupid?” Caeli cut in, Rafe turned to her with an angered look in his eyes. “It’s Tew and Avery, you imbecile.” She stated, hearing Cassius’ breath hitch as she insulted Rafe.

“Are you trying to get yourself killed?” Cassius whispered.

“Trust me,” Caeli whispered back as Rafe turned to look at Nadine again. “They killed each other,” Caeli spoke louder, for Nadine and Rafe to hear her.

“Good for them, what’s the point?” Rafe asked Nadine.

“Everyone obsessed with this treasure gets what they deserve,” Nadine answered, walking back up the stairs and out of the room.

“So you’re just going to leave us here to die?” Cassius asked, stepping to stand next to his mother.

“Oh, I'm just leaving. Whether you die or not, I don’t really care.” She answered, backing out and grabbing onto the trap door.

“Nadine, wait-”

“So long, Rafe.” Nadine cut Rafe off as she closed the door, locking them in.

“Nadine!” Rafe shouted as he got to the door, he tried to push it back open but it didn’t budge. “Nadine! You open this goddamn door right now!”

“Rafe, she’s gone!” Caeli shouted, running over to Sam to try and lift the massive piece of wood off of his body. She saw his chest rise and fall slowly, he was still alive. “C’mon, give me a hand and we’ll all get out of here.” She added, taking off some smaller pieces and then looking at the large piece… what would be the best way to get it off of him?

“Oh no, no that won’t work…” Rafe began mumbling to himself.

“Help me with Sam and I’ll help you open the door.” Caeli bargained as Casius was by her side getting ready to lift the piece of wood.

“No, I'm not going to be able to enjoy one of these coins knowing that you and the worthless Drake brothers are still sucking air,” Rafe stated, when Caeli looked over to him she saw that he had pulled a sword from one of the skeletons. Caeli pushed Cassius to the other side of Samuel, hoping that she could keep Rafe’s focus on herself. “And don’t get me started on your kid.”

“All right, just… just calm down. You can practice your fencing when you get outside.” Caeli stated, walking away from Sam and Cassius.

“Caeli, just shut up.” Rafe snapped, she curled her hands into fists. She needed that other sword…

“Seriously Rafe… this is insane, even for you.” Caeli stated calmly as Rafe approached her with the sword raised. She walked backwards and tried circling the room so she could hopefully get back to Avery and Tew’s skeletons, to the other sword, without Rafe realising what she was doing.

“You want to hear insane? ‘Nathan Drake raced a madman and his entire army to the steps of Shambala’.” Rafe took a swing at her which she dodged. “ ‘Nathan Drake and Caeli Porter found a lost city in the middle of the Rub’ al Khali desert’.” Rafe swung again, she dodged again, although this time the sword just cut through her jacket.

“God damn it, come on! We can get out of here together!” Caeli shouted, realising that she wasn’t going to be able to get to the other sword anytime soon.

“ ‘Nathan Drake discovered the fabled El Dorado’.” Rafe took another swing at her.

“C’mon Rafe, stop.” Caeli pleaded as she dodged another swing from him.

“ ‘An occult assassin kills those who oppressed her’.” Now Rafe was shifting his anger onto her. “ ‘Caeli Porter, able to take on an army by herself’.” He swung at her once again, but she noticed that he was finally changing corners of the room. She should be able to get the other sword soon. “ ‘Nathan Drake is a legend.’ You know I shot the man who told me that, and I also shot the one who said you were invincible.”

“I get it, you don’t like us very much…” Caeli stated.

“No, I don’t like them very much…” He pointed to Sam with the sword before pointing it back to her. “You… I loved you… and then you turned me down for _him_. That’s why I took your son in one the Order handed him to me, because of you, but you’ve made me realise something Caeli…”

“What’s that?” she asked him, not taking her eyes off of his.

“You have always been my main competition, not them. They are worthless, the brothers are worth nothing, but you… you are actually worth something, you have a brain that can solve any puzzle… and yet you waste such potential by throwing in your loyalty with the Drakes. I could have given you everything and instead, you chose to throw everything back at my face. You disrespected me, you laughed at me when I had a gun pointed to your head at the auction. You think _I_ am worthless, you think _I_ am incapable…” Rafe explained. “That is why I have learned to hate you.” He added, swinging at her once again.

This time she caught his arm, kneeing him in the stomach before headbutting him and throwing him to the wall. He pushed her back, and she ended up on the ground on her back with Rafe’s sword pushing closer to her throat as she used everything she could to push back against it.

“I sacrificed everything to find Avery, and I'm not going to let a couple of two-bit thieves, a senile con-man, a washed-up journalist, an emotionally unstable assassin and her teenage son take that from me!” He shouted, pushing his weight on top of the sword. Caeli managed to keep the blade from her throat, with one last push of strength she got him off of her. She moved quickly as he rolled across the floor from the force she had given and grabbed the other sword, finally. She didn’t want to use shadows, not if she could help it, her body was far too weak to handle it and that was clear from the way her hands were shaking.

“Enough!” She shouted as she pulled the sword from the skeleton and blocked another attack from Rafe.

“You care about that parade of losers so much… I'm going to make sure they join you.” Rafe told her, that was enough to stop her body from shaking with exhaustion. She was suddenly switched into ‘Assassin Caeli’. Her mind was focused solely on the fight at hand and throwing insults back at Rafe. She held the sword in two hands, readying herself with the training she’d had from the Order. Who knew fencing would come in handy one day?

“ _En garde_ , dickhead.”


	24. A Thief's End Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Caeli unleashes everything she has onto Rafe...

“ _En garde_ , dickhead,” Caeli spoke, shifting her weight into an optimal position.

“That’s the spirit,” Rafe responded, they began walking in a circle. “I assume you know how to sword fight,” Rafe stated, she tilted her head to the side.

“My last fencing lesson was when I was eleven… so I'm a bit of out of practice, I have the general gist though.” She replied, stepping forward and swinging the sword at Rafe, he blocked the attack but couldn’t stop her as she swung around the other way and sliced into his side. She took his pause of shock as a chance to turn her back to him and elbow him in the face before turning to face him once again and kicking him in the chest to hit one of the cage walls around the edge of the room.

She took two steps backwards and pointed the sword at him.

“I’ll let you live if you give up now.” She told him, Rafe shook his head and lunged at her, swinging his sword at her from the right, the left and the left again. Caeli barely managed to parry the attacks in time, but the fourth one was missed entirely. The strike cut through her jacket and sliced into her skin, she had moved just in time to avoid being impaled by the weapon.

Saying she was pissed would be an understatement.

She went to attack him but he blocked the swing, using her momentum against her he grabbed her arm and got to her unguarded side, kicking her in the back of the knee and forcing her to the ground for a moment.

“Hold… still.” Rafe told her, she breathed through her teeth as he had a hand on the back of her neck and his sword at the front. She elbowed him in the side, which bought her enough time to stand up once again and turn to face him.

“Quit prolonging the inevitable, my arm’s getting tired,” Rafe spoke through his teeth as he sized her up once more. She smirked at him.

“My arm’s fine.” She replied before he swung at her from the left, she parried the blow, he swung to her right, she parried the blow again, he went for her head and she ducked underneath it. From the low vantage point, she threw her body into Rafe’s, her shoulder landing in his stomach and winding him at the same time as he was pushed back into the cage wall. Her fatigue was beginning to catch up with her, but she wouldn’t let it be the end of her either.

At least, not while Cassius and Sam were still in danger.

That thought made her push harder, as Rafe began picking up speed so did she. If two things would get her through this fight it would be her pride and stubbornness. She would not lose to Rafe, of all the people in the world it wouldn’t be him.

It _couldn’t_ be him.

He came at her again, left, left, right, left, right… she blocked every swing and he backed off for a second. She used the retaliation to her advantage, lunging forward and swing at his left side. He blocked the blow with his sword before he moved closer to her and grabbed her arm, pushing her into the cage wall and swinging to her throat. She blocked the swing with her sword, but now they were at a temporary stalemate as Rafe tried pushing his sword closer to her throat and she kept pushing back.

“Now we’re getting somewhere.” He stated as she grunted with the effort of keeping him off of her.

“Are we? I don’t feel like we are.” She replied, throwing everything she had into pushing against him and throwing him off of her. She took one second to catch her breath before Rafe was attacking her again, she continued to block his attacks, but she figured that if he was using that much energy that he should tire soon. _Should._

He swung at her once more, but she found an opening and hit him in the cheek with the handle of her sword before elbowing him in the nose… he retaliated by grabbing her shoulders and shoving her to the ground where he once again went for her throat.

“This might hurt a little…” Rafe said as he pushed his sword down against hers, she kicked his side which forced him away from her, but not so far that she couldn’t reach him with her sword. She pushed herself onto one knee and swung at his stomach. She hit her target, she knew that as Rafe rolled away from her with an arm wrapped around his stomach.

“Not as much as that did, I'm sure.” She retorted to his comment, standing up slowly as he did the same.

“C’mon ‘unbeatable assassin’,” Rafe said darkly, his hair continued to fall out of its perfect shape.

Right. Left. Left. Right.

She parried each of the blows with perfect timing, wondering how the man was still picking up speed as the fight continued. She swung back at him, before having an opening that she used to kick him hard in the chest which sent him back a few steps.

“You know Rafe, you’re actually pretty good at this.” She complimented his ability with a sword before he lunged at her once more. Left, right, left… he went for her head once more and she ducked once again, this time using the lower point to swipe at his calf muscle and once again reached her target. She rose quickly, taking the chance as he stumbled backwards to swing at his shoulder…

But he blocked the attack.

Blocking the attack was how he got the opening the Caeli’s ribs, and he sliced into her skin once again… it was deep enough that she heard the metal scratching against her bone. The pain that shot through her body from the wound distracted her for a moment, which was enough to get Rafe to knock her to the ground once again. He stepped on her wrist for the hand that held the sword with enough force that she heard something crack, and the sword left her grasp. He kicked the weapon away, it landed in one of the piles of burning wood in the room.

“You know, underneath your façade of the daring assassin, you’re just a scared little girl…” he swung the sword and sliced into her stomach. The wound wasn’t deep but it was still painful. “…whose only skill is to run from danger.” Rafe finished, lifting the sword to swing at her throat and finish her off.

“Mum!” Cassius shouted, distracting Rafe as he jumped onto the man’s back. Rafe threw him off too easily, her son landing on his back without anything to defend himself with, and Rafe was getting ready to land a fatal blow on him.

If she wasn’t pissed before she was now.

She hit her hand on the ground as it became enveloped with shadows, pushing herself to stand up as more spirits surrounded her, the shadows in the room stretched towards her as she did so. It was enough to get Rafe to look back at her.

“I was going to let you live.” She stated simply, looking at her hands as her veins turned black with power. She no longer felt tired, she felt… empowered.

“If I recall correctly I was the one about to deal the final blow to you,” Rafe responded, seemingly forgetting about Cassius as the boy looked up to the ceiling and motioned for Caeli to look up too. The boy had a plan, Caeli nodded slowly, agreeing to it when she realised what the boy was intending.

“I was going to let you walk off of this ship and pretend that nothing ever happened…” she trailed off. “You aren’t scared of me, are you?” She asked him, still having not made eye contact with him.

“Scared of you? There’s nothing to be afraid-” he was cut off as she looked into his eyes. Her eyes would have turned to a demon-like black, the skin surrounding them would also be turning the same colour. She looked down to her hands once more and saw her fingertips were also beginning to look like she had dipped them in charcoal powder, that hadn’t happened before…

“You were going to kill an unarmed boy, my son right in front of me… you’ve threatened my entire family.” Her voice felt like it wasn’t hers, there were too many tones to be just one coming from her mouth. “You made a mistake, Rafe.” She told him, turning her hands so they could gather shadows in her palms and stopping them from circling her body. She had total control, maybe that was because she had complete clarity at this moment.

“ _I_ made a mistake, what about-”

“Enough!” She shouted, once again her voice was not alone as many others echoed through the room with hers. The spirits weren’t just speaking to her, they were with her… they were helping her. “You kept my son hostage for three years, my husband for two… you have threatened to exterminate my entire family, almost killed my son in front of me. I was going to let you live, yes, but people who go up against me always seem to make the same mistake which leads to me losing any will to provide mercy.”

“What’s that?” Rafe asked, trying to act as if he wasn’t afraid of her but she could see that he was.

“You threatened to kill my family… there’s nothing I am more willing to kill for than my _parade of losers_.” She told him, raising her hands at her sides. “Remember what I told I would do once you lost your leverage over me?” She asked him but she didn’t give him enough time to respond as she did what she had warned. She pushed everything she could onto him, the darkness that was in her hands flooded to him, surrounding him and filling his ears with the screams of the spirits that were on her side. It filled him with fear, to the point where he screamed for her to stop.

“I'm sorry! I'm sorry!” he shouted and so she drew the shadows away from him. With her breath shaking, she let the power go, looking at him with her natural eyes.

“You’re sorry you fucked with the wrong family.” She stated harshly, and he didn’t retaliate, so she looked over to Cassius who was in position. “Goodbye, Rafe.” She said before Cassius cut through a bit of rope with a dagger, it sent a pile of tied up treasure tumbling onto Rafe’s body, the weight and momentum of the golden artefacts would have killed him instantly.

Caeli knew that for certain when a new shadow wriggled its way free from under the treasure.

“Holy shit…” she heard a voice say as she stared at the pile of gold… she guessed the wardrobe that was a part of the pile would have been what killed Rafe for certain. She turned to look at Sam, the one who had spoken. He was awake.

She ran over to him as he grunted, trying to remove the piece of wood from himself. She and Cassius also tried lifting it off with him, but it didn’t work.

“We have to get you out of here,” Caeli stated as her head became too light to be healthy.

“It’s too heavy,” Sam stated.

“Try again.” She instructed through gritted teeth, she wasn’t leaving him behind. They did as she said, but it still didn’t work.

“It’s no use,” Sam responded.

“Try again.” She stated bluntly as her head began spinning. She couldn’t call on the shadows again, she knew she wouldn’t survive if she did.

“It’s no use Caeli-”

“Try again!” She shouted, looking to Sam with tears in her eyes. “I did not come this far with you to lose you to a fucking piece of wood.” She told him. Trying to lift the beam of wood again proved fruitless as she lost her grip and fell backwards. “God damn it!”

“Listen to me, just listen,” Sam told her, she shook her head.

“I know what you're going to try and do…” she trailed off.

“All I ever wanted to do was find this treasure, it sucks that Nate didn’t do it with us, but you are here. You and Cassius, my family is here with me, we found it together. That’s all I wanted, was to find Avery’s treasure with my family.” He stated, she shook her head again.

“Don’t,” she warned him.

“We did it okay? You two are safe, that’s all that matters.”

“Shut up…” Caeli said half-heartedly. “There’s got to be another way.”

“You’ve gotta go. You have to go, right now.” Sam stated, she closed her eyes as dizziness became harder for her to ignore.

“There’s gotta be something…” She trailed off, opening her eyes again.

“You’ve gotta go!” Sam shouted, pushing her shoulder to make her move away. “There is no other way!”

“I'm not leaving you!” She shouted, looking to Cassius who was looking for any kind of way to escape the room.

“Caeli, this whole ship is about to blow-"

“I don’t give a shit Sam, I’m not leaving you here to die! I’m not willing to let you go when I just got you back! Stop trying to convince me because it won’t bloody well work!” She shouted, her head throbbing. “You came back to face death because of me and how the decision of having to leave Cassius behind until a better and safer opportunity arose broke me. If you honestly think I’m going to leave you here, alone, to die, you are so far from wrong that it’s almost like you don’t know me at all.”

“After watching you just then I feel like I don’t anymore...” Sam told her.

“Good try, Samuel, but unless you actually believe what you’re saying, I won’t either.” Easily picking up on his lie, it was another attempt at making her leave him behind. It wouldn’t work.

Not this time.

“That’s what you were doing in Panama, wasn’t it?” She asked as she realised the technique was the same from that argument. “You trying to push me away, to keep me safe... you knew the only way I would leave was if I felt you didn’t want me there anymore.” The look on Sam’s face told her she was right. “You’re a goddamn idiot, Samuel Drake.”

“I think I have an idea,” Cassius stated, Caeli turned to look at the boy. “It’s very dangerous but will be effective.”

“So it’s a Drake plan then...” She almost joked.

“What?” Cassius seemed confused at her statement.

“Don’t worry, what’s the plan?” she asked as he got extremely close to her, almost as if he didn’t want Sam to hear his plan.

“Canon, shoot into the bottom of the ship, water lift beam of wood, we have an escape route.” He explained.

“Oh, definitely a Drake plan.” She responded, Cassius still looked confused as to what she meant but let it go none-the-less.

“What’s going on?” Sam asked and Caeli ignored him.

“Alright... seems feasible, I mean we have nothing else so let’s hope this works.” She said before coughing from the smoke, she’d almost forgotten the ship was on fire until then. She and Cassius tilted the canon and caught the end of a shattered piece of wood on fire.

“Oh god, no...” Sam stated.

“Trust us,” Cassius stated before he triggered the canon and took out the bottom of the ship.

Chaos ensued from that point on, they managed to get Sam free thanks to the rising water in the room. They all took one look at each other before diving underneath the water and getting out of the ship.

Once they broke the surface outside of the ship Caeli noticed something.

“The cave is collapsing on itself!” She yelled to the other two who immediately began swimming towards the exit. Caeli was struggling to keep her head above water, the fatigue and lack of food for the day was hitting her hard, aside from overusing her powers.

“Just get out of the cave...” she whispered to herself, repeating it over and over again as she got closer to the exit far too slowly. Her body became heavier and heavier with each stroke, she was tired and unsure of how much longer she could go for.

Once they were safe, once Sam and Cassius were safe she could give up. Only then. As she continued swimming she continued going underwater for periods of time... taking in water as she lost control of her breathing.

Somehow she made it out of the cave before the entrance caved in...

And once she saw the Sam and Cassius were no longer in danger her body seemed to just stop working. They were safe. She couldn’t swim any longer...

She just couldn’t.

She watched as their shapes continued swimming as she began sinking, unable to do anything but observe them getting closer to shore as her lungs began to burn with the lack of oxygen. Her chest and head felt like they were about to explode, but she waited until their shapes left the water, were truly safe until she let her body gasp for air, knowing it would be water filling her lungs instead of the oxygen she needed.

They were safe, that was all that mattered.


	25. Resuscitation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we conclude our story...

They made it, they’d made it out alive. They were safe. Sam began laughing at how manic the situation had felt and sounded, but they were okay and they were together.

Finally ashore he looked to Cassius who also had a smile on his face mirroring his father’s.

“We did it,” Sam stated, touching the boy’s shoulder. “Caeli we...” he trailed off as he looked over his shoulder for her but didn’t see her brown hair. He searched the water but saw nothing, looked around the land they had pulled themselves onto and saw no evidence of her.

“Shit.”

He realised then how tired she was, how _exhausted_ Caeli was. Back on the ship, her eyes had been closing far too often, her hands absentmindedly touching anything solid around her to ground herself as her head must have been spinning...

Without a second thought, he jumped back into the water, looking for anything that could resemble a drowning human being beneath the surface. He came up to breath before ducking underneath again and saw a sinking shadow.

It was her.

He immediately began swimming towards her and linked his arms around her body, pulling her back to the surface. He swam sidestroke, pulling her along with him before Cassius helped pull her onto land. Once she was out of the water Sam jumped into action, listening to her chest for a heartbeat and finding none.

“You aren’t dying on me, alright.” He told her, opening her mouth before he locked his mouth onto hers, breathing into her in hopes he had reached her in time. He began chest compressions, counting to thirty before repeating rescue breaths.

_Give her a reason._

A familiar voice echoed in his ears as he began compressions again.

“Mum?” He asked, Cassius looked at him in complete confusion but let it go. He would ask later.

_Her body gave up on her, but her soul, who she is, found that as long as you and Cassius were safe that she didn’t have to push on anymore. She doesn’t just need CPR, she needs a reason to live._

There was no doubt that it was Cassandra Morgan that was speaking to him, he smiled a painful smile as he finished chest compressions and tried more rescue breaths.

“Fine, Caeli, you want a reason to live, I’ll give you one. Hell, I’ll give you a hundred if I had the time.” He told her, beginning compressions once more. “But I’ll start with some basic knowledge, this won’t be the last time any of us are in danger and we’ll need you. You have a son who needs you, a whole family that will kill me if you die on my watch if I don’t get to myself first.” He paused to give her more breaths, then went back to compressions.

“You want a reason to live, how about realising the fact that it’s not fucking fair if you die on me. I did not get you back for just this hunt, okay? That’s not fair on me, and it’s not fair on Cassius either.” Rescue breaths. Compressions. “Your son has had you for a fucking day and you decide it’s okay to give up, no, not on my watch, Caeli Porter.” Rescue breaths. Compressions.

“You want one more reason because those weren’t good enough. Here’s a really simple one... remember what you said to me during that fucking argument at Panama? You said you need me, well guess what Porter, I need you too.” Rescue breaths. Compressions. “If you aren’t here with me I won’t be able to cope. You are the one thing I cannot live without, Caeli, and if I lose you I don’t know what the hell I’m going to do.”

Rescue breaths. Chest compressions.

“I need you, God damn it!”

Coughing.

Sam immediately turned Caeli onto her side as she began gagging and coughing up the water she had allowed her body to take in.

Alive. She was alive.

Her body was shaking with the cold of the water, but there was nothing he could do about that aside from offer his body warmth... but first, she had to get rid of the water in her lungs.

She sat up slowly, her lips blue with the cold her body felt and her skin pale from drowning. She couldn’t seem to stop coughing, but she did eventually stop throwing up the water she had swallowed.

She put her arms around Sam’s neck, not being able to speak as she kept coughing, the violence of the action becoming less and less so with each bout. When she was able to breathe comfortably again she held out an arm, Sam didn’t need to see that she was looking at Cassius who joined their embrace.

Sam closed his eyes as he shifted one arm to sit around Cassius' shoulders, his other tightening around Caeli.

“I’m sorry...” she whispered, seeming unable to speak at a tone any higher than that.

“There’s nothing to be sorry for," Sam told her, she didn’t argue, but he wasn’t sure whether that was because she accepted his response or whether it was because it hurt too much to respond. They sat at the shoreline for an unknown amount of time, they only broke apart when Nate and Elena came to them, seeing the disaster of the collapsed cave behind them and seeing how Caeli had seemingly shrunk, her persona shattered with facing death and almost not returning. Her personality was what made her seem to fill a room, and without it, she was just a small human being that wanted nothing more than the safety of those she cared about.

Sam carried her a good amount of the way back to the plane, the only reason she allowed it was because she had fallen asleep and was unable to argue against it.

At least until they had to swim to get to the plane, where Sam once again helped her get there safely.

Once onboard Sam had no other purpose than to layer blankets onto Caeli after she was strapped into the seat in the cockpit, keeping her warm and as still as possible while she drifted off to sleep once again.

Her rest was well earned.

“What happened?” Nate asked Sam gently once they were sure Caeli was asleep.

“Um, I was unconscious for a good chunk of it but...” Sam knew that Nate wanted to know why Caeli was passed out, not the entire story at that moment. “...from what I can gather we were trapped in a below-deck room, Rafe wanted to kill all of us so Caeli fought back against him, they had a sword fight which I woke at the end of, Rafe almost killed her and then Cassius which triggered Caeli into using shadows... she and Cassius killed Rafe. While we were escaping her body gave up on her and she drowned. She wasn’t breathing... I...” Sam was in distress just talking about it, which was why Nate grabbed his shoulder.

“We’re all okay now. We’ll get her to a hospital in case of secondary drowning... but we are all alive and we are all together. That was more than I honestly thought we would have after this.” Nate told him.

“I have to say I agree with you there, little brother.”

***

Caeli hated hospitals, everyone was extremely aware of that fact. When she had broken her arm all those years ago she tried her best to avoid going into the sterile place, she had also tried her best this time to not go in, at least until she realised how close she had come to not coming back from death. Nate and Elena stayed with them until Caeli was discharged from hospital, from there it was time to go home…

Everyone was back at the docks, Nate and Elena taking their belongings off of Sully’s plane to catch a flight back to America. As Nate got his last back, Sam was taking the liberty of telling Elena and Cassius about Nate’s magic phase when he was younger. Caeli had heard about it before, the same rabbit story as what was being told at that moment.

“Hey, what are you telling them?” Nate asked as he came back over to his wife.

“Just about your little ‘magic’ phase,” Elena replied, Sam finally stopped talking with his hands and put an arm over Caeli’s shoulder. Cassius was next to his mother, listening carefully to the conversation and taking in everything he could.

“Oh, I hate you,” Nate said as he looked Sam in the eyes, the comment made Caeli laugh.

“What was your stage name?” Elena asked, and Nate was already looking embarrassed before he even answered.

“Go on, tell her,” Caeli stated, a smile present on her face. She was still tired from finding Libertalia and everything that had happened surrounding that event, but she was feeling better and her mood had improved significantly after leaving the hospital.

Even though she still had to take antibiotics for the cuts that Rafe had left on her body.

“Nate the Great,” Nate answered a little quieter than his normal tone of voice. Sam and Caeli began to laugh again, Cassius was smiling and so was Elena. “It’s not funny. It makes sense.”

“In his defence he actually… he was pretty good.” Sam stated, honing in his laughter.

“Uh-huh,” Nate responded, not quite believing his brother as he put his bag down on the dock.

“Hey, look, Sam, it has been an experience getting to meet you.” Elena changed the subject, holding her hand out to him.

“With a handshake?” Sam asked, almost offended that Elena would even think that was acceptable. Sam took his arm away from Caeli’s shoulders.

“Well-” Elena began to say something but was cut off as Sam lifted his arms for a hug.

“Bring it in for the real thing, sister.” He stated and as they hugged he whispered something into Elena’s ear that Caeli couldn’t quite hear, but she didn’t feel the need to. The two broke apart and almost immediately, Sam’s arm was around Caeli once again.

“I’ll join you in a sec,” Nate said to Elena as she went to walk to the taxi.

“Yeah,” Elena responded, picking up her bag and walking away as Caeli waved goodbye to her.

“I like her,” Sam stated, almost making Caeli sigh. “God help her, she sure seems to love you.” He added, pulling a cigarette and a lighter out from his pockets. Although, one glare from Caeli sent the objects back where they had come from.

“I know right,” Nate replied, looking to Cassius, Caeli and his brother in turn. “Listen, the offer still stands,” Nate said, hitting his brother’s shoulder in a somewhat affectionate way.

“We appreciate it…” Sam trailed off, Caeli looked to Cassius who looked back to her with a smile.

“But we’re good.” Caeli finished, turning back to look at Nate.

“I know, but if you feel like you’re imposing you’re not, we’ve talked about it-”

“It’s not about that,” Caeli stated.

“It’s a little about that…” Sam corrected her, but she shook her head.

“Listen, Nate. None of us are ready to let this go, after this treasure we’re all feeling empty. I thought I was ready to settle down all those years ago, but I’ve realised that I won’t ever be. Cassius is the same, it’s how we’re raised… sitting in the same place for too long makes you feel exposed and vulnerable and your brother…” Caeli trailed off, looking up to him. “He’s been in one place for too long.”

“Besides, you’ve got a few ancient cities on me and I can’t let that slide so…” Sam added in.

“Cassius…” Nate turned to the teenage boy.

“I’m not being pressured into it, this is what I want to do. I'm going to be with my family, and Mum’s right… staying still in the same place makes me feel extremely open and vulnerable.” The boy replied.

“All right, but if you ever want to have a safe place that you can stay at for however long you want-”

“I can come to you?” Cassius asked, figuring where his uncle was going with his statement.

“Yeah,” Nate responded, putting a hand on the boy’s shoulder. Cassius nodded and looked to be in thought about it. “If these two ever get into something that you don’t want to you can come and stay with us, no problem.” Cassius looked to his parents after Nate finished speaking.

“Alright, I will,” Cassius replied before a car horn beeped from the road.

“Oh… that’s our ride.” Nate stated as Elena waved from the back of the taxi, her bags already in the boot.

“Yeah…” Caeli responded.

“Uh… Sam, we’ve come far.” Nate stated to his brother.

“We sure have, little brother,” Sam responded, the two hugged.

“Listen, you don’t do anything I wouldn’t do, alright?” Nate said after he pulled away, as he was picking up his bag.

“Get outta here, vamoose,” Sam told him, the younger brother smiled before walking to the taxi.

“We’ll catch up soon!” Caeli shouted after him, he turned to look back at them and nodded before reaching the taxi and climbing in. With his absence, Sully came up to them. They watched as the taxi drove away.

“You got a light?” Sully asked and Sam pulled his lighter out of his pocket.

“So, Victor…” Sam trailed off, the older man looked to Caeli who had a smile on her face. “…what’s next for you, hm?”

“Mmm…” Sully lit his cigar. “Well, before I got dragged into this I was working on a business deal of sorts.”

“Of sorts?” Cassius asked and Caeli noticed that he was slowly speaking more… his speech probably came with trusting the people around him.

“Hm… dangerous?” Sam asked.

“Eh, with these people, yeah it’s up there,” Sully responded.

“Well…” Caeli trailed off, stepping away from Sam and standing in front of Sully. “I just so happen to know a family of criminals and assassins, recently freed of their oppressors, hospital and prison who might be perfect for this kind of work.” She stated, her hands in the pockets of her jacket with a smirk on her face.

“Oh, I don’t know… are they trustworthy?” Sully asked, looking her in the eyes.

“More or less,” Cassius replied with a smirk on his face that looked all too similar to his mother’s as he stepped to stand next to her.

“How’s their Portuguese?” Sully asked next, Caeli tilted her head to the side.

“Well, two of us were raised in an occult order who force-fed us about twenty to thirty different languages. I know mine’s good.” Caeli responded.

“Mine is too,” Cassius responded and Sam looked like he was thinking hard on it.

“I know a few sentences… but they can teach me some more if necessary,” Sam responded to which Sully smiled.

“That’ll do. Come on.” The man told them, walking back towards the seaplane. Sam looked back to the road, where the taxi had been.

“Earth to Sam…” Caeli stated before the mentioned man looked into her eyes. “He’s going to be fine, now let’s get going.” She told him, and they all started walking towards the plane together. As a family.

“Do I get to use the Drake name now?” Cassius asked which made Caeli laugh.

“I feel like you deserve it after the canon plan.” She responded.

“What did you mean by that was a ‘Drake plan’ by the way?” Cassius asked next.

“I mean it was effective but had a very good chance of ending very badly. You’ll learn that is how many of the Drake brother’s plans go.” She replied, looking to Sam.

“So I'm a Drake now?” Cassius asked next, looking to his father who smiled back at him and nodded.

“Yeah kid, you're one of us.”


End file.
